What We Missed In...Blessings and Curses

The blessings and curses listed in Deuteronomy tyrannise our 21st-century sensibilities with all manner of anxieties and fears. The promises of blessings might encourage and cheer us for a brief moment, but the sheer intensity and volume of curses destabilise us. They confirm our worst feelings of dread about God - that there is some kind of divine karma at work in life, which rewards us for good behaviour and punishes us for bad behaviour. How has such a portrait of God shaped us and our communities? What do we have to dismantle and re-learn from these ancient texts in order to understand how they speak to us today?