Can’t heaven wait? | Mary Sheehy Moe

Can you hear the prayer of the children, softly pleading for silence in a shattered world?

Last year Ukraine saw its sharpest increases in war-caused childhood casualties since 2022, averaging 16 per week. The number of children experiencing anxiety, trauma, and grief as a result of the endless Russian assault? Incalculable. Yet our country has backed away from facing down this lawless bully, dismissing Russia’s invasion as equally Ukraine’s fault.

Angry guns preach a gospel full of hate, blood of the innocent on their hands.

Between October 2023 and October 2025, Israeli strikes killed or injured more than 50,000 Gaza children, including at least 1,000 mere babies. “How many more dead girls and boys will it take?” UNICEF asked. “What level of horror must be live-streamed before the international community … takes bold, decisive action to force the end of this ruthless killing of children?”

By July 2025, 28 nations, including our once-treasured allies in Europe and, separately, our new besties in the Arab states, answered UNICEF’s plea and called for an end to the bloodshed in Gaza. Our country did not join them.

Since the “ceasefire,” between October 2025 and mid-January 2026, over 100 Gaza children have been killed. Now 33 of every 1,000 children in Gaza never reach their 5th birthday. Twenty die before they’re 28 days old. “Terror-induced silence” among children is commonplace.

Empty eyes with no more tears to cry, turning heavenward, toward the light …

We were told we were freeing Venezuela from their authoritarian leader, stabilizing the country, and restoring democracy. Pfft. We just wanted the oil … and Cuba. Before our take-over, 5 million Venezuelan children were starving; 3.9 million, out of school. Post-“rescue,” they still are.

Ho-hum. On to Cuba. With Venezuela’s oil lifeline in a chokehold, “[Cuba’s] going down for the count,” our president gloated. Starting with Cuban children, it appears. Lack of supplies and medications have now limited pediatric care and reduced children’s cancer survival rates. Between scarcity of resources and constant power outages, some 11,000 children can’t access the surgeries they need. The rest struggle to find sanitary water. Food. School.

Crying, "Jesus, help me to feel the sun again upon my face! For when darkness clears, I know you're near, bringing peace again."

In the first month of our war with Iran, over 1,190 child casualties, including 206 deaths, occurred in Iran alone. Somewhere between 110-168 of the fatalities occurred in that February 28 strike on a girls' school in Minab. It looks like the mistake was ours. “We’re investigating it,” we’re told. Right — like Israel is “ceasing fire.”

Would Americans ever forget, much less forgive, such an assault on innocents in our country? Neither will Iranians. We just traded the pencil-and-paper target Iran had taped to our back for a big, bold bulls-eye tattoo. The implications for what it will now take in lives and dollars to keep Americans safe will reverberate for a generation, maybe longer. Undeterred, our president promises we’ll “just keep bombing our little hearts out.”

Crying, "Jesus, help me to feel the love again in my own land! But if unknown roads lead away from home, give me loving arms, away from harm."

We don’t bomb the little hearts of out of most countries’ children. But in less than a year, thanks to our abandonment of the “soft power” (aka moral high ground) of our USAID programs, an estimated 500,000 children worldwide have died from avoidable illnesses.

Here at home, cuts to SNAP funding have plunged millions of American children into food insecurity. Although malnutrition and developmental delays will inevitably ensue, we’ve also cut children’s access to health care. Lack of access to affordable housing has left nearly 2.5 million American children homeless, 1.2 million of whom are under the age of 6. Don’t even get me started on gun deaths.

“Let the little children come unto me,” said the guy whose sacrifice and resurrection many of us remember this weekend, “for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these.” I’m sure it does. But, surely, they should have a better time on earth — and a longer one — before they go.