Word from the Lake Charles pulpits seemed to focus more on a person’s moral strength to endure than on the will to change the circumstances that called on that strength. The service offered a collective, supportive arena, it seemed, within which it was safe to feel helpless, sad, or lost. As in an hour of therapy, the individual drew strength from support in order to endure what had to be endured. The church had given comfort to Harold and Annette Areno. Another grief-stricken parishioner, the mother of an ill child living in the highly polluted town of Mossville, told me, “I don’t know how I
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