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Julia Neuberger, Senior Rabbi at the West London Synagogue

Over the weekend, hundreds of people in Colombia died in floods after extraordinary rainfall, and even more are missing. Our hearts go out to those who have lost family and friends, and to the thousands of others whose homes have been destroyed by rising mud, who are now homeless, orphaned or widowed. It’s a ‘natural disaster’, we’re told, yet we know that poor people are far more likely to be affected by such disasters, worldwide, because they are more likely to live in flood plains, inhabit worse constructed houses, and live in less protected neighbourhoods.

Last week, Professor Sir Michael Marmot, world expert on health inequalities, came to preach at my synagogue. He pointed out that the further you go east on the Jubilee line in London, the lower your life expectancy. And, if you live in Kingston upon Thames in Surrey, your life expectancy is some ten years greater than it is in Kingston upon Hull, Hull as we know it.

Years ago, I heard a banana farmer from the Windward Islands talking after his whole crop was blasted by a hurricane, saying that ‘God will provide.’ Well, God may or may not provide, but I believe we need to give God a hand. God gave us brains to respond to what happens, to empathise, and to devise ways to stop disasters happening again. My naughty great aunt used to do the football pools on the basis that ‘we must give dear God a chance.’’ She was right- I think we MUST give dear God a chance. And that means human beings, with our God given hearts and minds, devising ways to stop some of these disasters, and to mitigate the effects of those we can’t stop. The Colombians are facing a tragedy. So are many other people around the world, for many different reasons. The challenge is to think of ways to heal the wounds, and stop further tragedies from occurring. It’s immensely difficult- but if we save even one life, it is as if- so the rabbis tell us- we have saved an entire world.