Temporal Kingdoms cause concerns

The texts today from the Roman Catholic Lectionary offer a opportunity to see our spiritual journey to transcend time and space with the background of the events which mark our temporal existence. Daniel has great value to his captors because of the authority and clarity with which he is able to create an image of the succession of rulers of the people. We continue today to seek and be enticed by those who can give us some hint of the future. It may be a horoscope, some "Celtic fore runner", a dream sequence or the clarity of the statistician or demographer. When Jesus addresses the events which will precede the end of the earth in the text from the Gospel of Luke, we are both encouraged and disappointed. The pattern of human existence and tragedy which He recounts is our experience today. Scholars of the humanities will confirm that humanity has always struggled  with power, oppression, greed and natural disaster. The other constant in our history is the desire to know the answers to the great questions of Why and What and Who which arise as we ponder the meaning of our existence and our thirst for intimacy with the Presence which is transcendent of human folly and errant direction.