Is there a reason?
I hear this a lot in life, especially when some sad thing happens or when a tragedy hits. Someone always says, “It must have happened for a reason. Everything happens for a reason.”
Does it?
Is there a vast library somewhere called The Library of Reasons, with billions and billions of books on the shelves inside? And in each book is a person, the pages filled with the billions of moments in our lives.
Let’s face it. Since humans became humans, an estimated 117 billion people have been born on this Earth. And most humans live for approximately 41 million minutes. That is 24 billion moments. So those are some big books, in a big library, filled with all the reasons.
Because if there is a reason for the boy drowning in the lake at that moment, there is a reason I tied my shoe five minutes ago.
I’m thinking about this because on this date, September 27, 1590, Pope Urban VII died 13 days after being chosen as the Pope. His reign is the shortest papacy in the history of the Catholic Church.
But it kind of makes you wonder. Is there a God above who said, “Whoopsy, boys. You sent the wrong puff of white smoke up the chimney. Wrong Pope.”
Kind of like when the Touchdown Jesus got struck by lightning and burnt to the ground.
So that Pope. Pope Urban VII was born Giovanni Battista Castagna in Rome in 1521. He came from a noble family and studied at some university in Italy.
This guy, Giovanni, earned a doctorate in civil law and canon law when he finished his studies at the University of Bologna. That’s kind of funny to me. I might have to go abroad and get a degree from the University of Bologna. Just seems right for me.
Anyway, he served as a lawyer and then later became a priest.
Then a governor. And on. All the while making his way up the papal ladder until finally becoming Pope.
Two things about his very short reign. He gave rise to the world’s first known public smoking ban. He threatened to excommunicate anyone who “took tobacco in the porchway of or inside a church, whether it be by chewing it, smoking it with a pipe or sniffing it in powdered form through the nose.”
I imagine the “No Smoking” signs when up around the Vatican, first thing.
“Vietato Fumare” in bold red letters with a black background, tacked up on all the walls.
And also, on a much different note. Urban VII was known for his charity to the poor. He did things like subsidizing Roman bakers so they could sell bread under cost. And with the dudes in his very own court? He restricted their spending on luxury items. They had to keep things simple. He also subsidized public works projects throughout the Papal States. Finally, Urban VII was strictly against nepotism and shut down the “good old boy” network under his control.
So he sounds like a pretty good guy to me. What could be the reason for him dying so abruptly? Did God have his reasons?
As it turns out, malaria was one reason. Urban VII died in Rome on September 27, 1590, shortly before midnight — yep —of malaria. His estate, I should add, went for use as dowries for poor young girls.
I don’t know what the answer to my question is. I have no way of knowing if this Universe is a precisely timed circuit of events or if it is all some big random bunch of molecules just bumping into one another without direction or cause.
I wonder. And I wonder.
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“That which can be asserted without evidence, can be dismissed without evidence.”
― Christopher Hitchens
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“The heart has its reasons which reason knows not.”
― Blaise Pascal
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“Tell people there’s an invisible man in the sky who created the universe, and the vast majority will believe you. Tell them the paint is wet, and they have to touch it to be sure.”
― George Carlin
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