mir·a·cle Pronunciation: \ˈmir-i-kəl\ Function: noun 1: an extraordinary event manifesting divine intervention in human affairs.2: an extremely outstanding or unusual event, thing, or accomplishment. mir·a·cle (ˈmir-i-kəl) n. 1. An event that appears inexplicable by the laws of nature and so is held to be supernatural in origin or an act of God.

Last month an extraordinary thing happened.  US Airways Flight 1549, losing both of its engines shortly after take off from La Guardia airport, makes an incredible emergency landing in the Hudson River saving all 155 passengers.  I certainly understand the utterance of “miracle”; What other expletive can you say upon witnessing such a fantastic and unusual event?  But to hold and believe it was a bona fide divine intervention is simply irresponsible thinking, and moreover, demeaning to to the skills, fortitude, and bravery of the pilot and tower crew.

The term miracle used to be reserved for not just fantastic and unusual events, but also those that could not be explained in any natural or physical terms.  This event certainly was fantastic and unusual, but in no way a violation of the laws of physics.  I suppose in this day and age where true miracles of the physics-defying nature are few and far between (read: nonexistent) believers have silently dropped that requirement from their list of miracle criteria.  So now we have,

Of course, the silent criterion  is that any given miraculous event be one that somehow benefits the lives or life of a group of people or an individual, respectively.  When the believers cry “miracle” triumphantly to us Doubting Thomases we reflexively ask “Where were those hands on the morning of September 11, 2001?”  To which the inevitable response is some variant upon “God works in mysterious ways.”  Bullshit.

How is it that when he works a miracle for good it’s not so mysterious, but when he fails to make an appearance in the face of human tragedy it’s suddenly a mystery?  It sounds a lot an all-too-human codependency.  “Little Johnny, your father loves you very much, but he won’t be able to take you to the ball game because he has to work to support you,” when she knows full well  he’s abandoned his son to go out drinking with his buddies.  Only in this case the co-dependency isn’t to maintain the peace but to preserve a belief that is diminishing in credibility vis-à-vis the facts and honest analysis.

If God is a mystery, then we can’t pretend to know why he would seem to “save” anyone, including Flight 1549.  If God’s motives can be known, and he chose to show mercy towards a doomed airline, simply evidenced by the obvious – the plane made a safe landing – then it stands to reason that we can use the obvious to ascertain that God was absent on 09/11/2001.  You can’t have it both ways.

But let’s entertain this new and improved concept of “miracle” for a moment, that is, the improved version that doesn’t require anything supernatural to occur, but only the rare and fantastic (interestingly enough, the dictionary definition makes no mention of something “good” happening, but that’s neither here nor there).

If we embrace this concept then it follows that anything unusual and fantastic is, in fact, a miracle.  So perhaps this is what those hands were doing on that fateful day in September,

After all, let’s give credit where credit is due.  This is where of course that silent criterion of “for good” comes up along side its twin brother, “free will.”  Typically, when the rules that the believer sets out, as in this example, for a miracle to have been said to occur (as mentioned above, much loosened to allow for many more miracles than before!  New and Improved!) they immediately break their own rules.  This can’t possibly be a miracle!  But why not?  Perhaps one little boy that was orphaned now has a basketball coach as an adopted father and God will answer his prayers to be an over-earning NBA star.  Never mind that it’s more than likely that the 2,974 had the free will to live that day.  Disregard  questions of God’s justice – hopefully the non-believer won’t bring that up.  And aren’t near 3000 lives worth a little boy’s dreams?

But wait, isn’t it true that we can’t know God’s ways?  So how can we say he’s good?  Isn’t that a “way?” No, we can’t know that!  Perhaps God saved the Hudson-bound plane, with the help of the pilot’s 40 years of experience and being on a board of aviation safety merely so the serial killer on board would have the chance to come murder your entire family while they slept as you were on a rather non-miraculous flight to Denver.   After all, God works in mysterious ways.

~YK

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