The Lesson of the Locusts

The good people of Massachusetts recently suffered a massive invasion of "biblical" proportions.

This may surprise you, but according to

a Public Religion Research Institute opinion poll, 38 percent of Americans believe that God uses nature to bring divine judgment upon humankind.

And since that kind of judgment is normally understood as a punishment for human wrongdoing, what do you suppose those 38 percent of Americans might conclude about the residents of Massachusetts, who last year, suffered through a massive caterpillar invasion?

Just saying "caterpillar invasion" straight out like that may sound funny, but it's no joke. Here's how a Boston Globe article from last June opened its report on the plague: "They are hungry, hairy and covered in warts. They hang from the trees like joke-shop moustaches, drop onto picnic tables and infiltrate tents and open shirt collars. Walk into the woods these days and the sound of raindrops hitting a tarp turns out to be their little black droppings showering the forest floor. A biblical outbreak of voracious, finger-long gypsy moth...