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Good morning. The breath of the ruthless is like a storm driving against a wall. That comparison of the threat of war from ruthless leaders, to the threat of a destructive storm, is from the Biblical prophecy of Isaiah. It is, of course, by no means the first, nor the last time that the march of warlike armies has been compared to a coming tempest. Anyone who has taken a high school class in literature may remember the idea of the so-called ‘pathetic fallacy’ in works of fiction, by which the weather in the skies provides the backdrop to the character-narrative on the ground. Yet sometimes truth really does seem to outdo fiction. With yet another North Atlantic storm on the way just as the destructive Eunice passes on, the military storm-clouds swirling over Ukraine look ever more menacing. Both threats are causes of fear, and from fear that terrible paralysis that whispers, both to those directly involved and to those at a distance, that there is nothing to be done, that we are powerless. But Isaiah’s words that accompany his ‘storm of war’ simile remind us that this isn’t true. They also contain the prayer You have been a refuge for the poor, a refuge for the needy in their distress, a shelter from the storm and a shade from the heat. reminding the pray-ers, as all prayers do, that God’s actions can be imaged by their own – that there are things we can do. Before storms break, people and governments can prepare for them. And now, with much more climate science than even a generation ago, we know that the more we reduce carbon output, the less severe future storms will be. Before wars break out, people and governments can work to prevent them, both through public channels of diplomacy and the essential private communication of individuals. And after the storms break, if they do, the actions we can take do not change – they just intensify. Wartime Christian thinker and writer C S Lewis wrote: War creates no absolutely new situation: it simply aggravates the permanent human situation so that we can no longer ignore it. Human life has always been lived on the edge of a precipice. That precipice is the ever-present human decision between life for others and life for self, between the grabbing of power, and the gift of freedom to others, between retiring to our comfort zones, or sharing discomfort for the sake of others. During the storm, the needs and opportunities to give refuge, shelter, acts of love, sacrifice, and peace-making, towards our global and local neighbours reflect the later words of the one Isaiah was looking forward to: Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God.