God in the Blackout

This chapter turns to a sermon by Jacob Philip Rudin. Rudin's sermon reflects an intensifying crisis of faith that can be seen emerging in sermons from the First World War, and that would become a prevalent motif in the Second. ‘Where is God in this blackout of humanity? How can He permit this savagery to come to pass? How can He allow the destruction of little children, of cities and of homes to go on unchecked?’ Rudin asks rhetorically, voicing the questions of his congregants and confessing that he too has wrestled with them. He then, of course, provides an answer, shifting the responsibility from God to human folly and indifference. The ‘blackout’ experienced in very real terms throughout so many British cities becomes a metaphor expressing the darkening of the moral landscape, with innocent human beings suffering because of the evil of some and the callousness of others. Throughout the relatively unstructured discourse, the leitmotif of the title frequently recurs: God is indeed present in the blackout, present with the anguished victims, waiting for human beings to learn the lesson of their folly and return to Him.