Thanks for sharing, Randy. And I really do mean that - and feel compelled to emphasize how I mean that, given what I’m about to say. Which in itself (I suppose?) is a morally tragic failure, because notice how with that opening, I make it all about me, and my conscience instead of about the 350,000 children in Somalia who will likely die of starvation.
Dale brought up a link in the earlier private version of this thread for a work titled “The Hole in our Gospel” (thanks, @Dale), with a reference to an analogy: What sort of sensational news and reactionary panic would it cause if 100 Jetliners all crashed today? And yet the equivalent in preventable deaths is happening every day. I presume this is the analogy or “the hole” that Dale sees being referred to. Along with the very callous news equivalents of “one American fireman = 5 English bobbies = 50 Arabs = 500 Africans” in terms of our thresholds of concern. Terrible. Very terrible we tell ourselves, shaking our heads sadly and disapprovingly. And then we go about our day.
There is an answer to this of course: That callous equation was addressed to an American audience who is expected to identify more closely with the fireman. But that equation doesn’t work at all if you’re the Englishman, or the citizen of Yemen, or the Somalian parent whose village is dying of starvation. For them that same equation (in terms of care and concern if not in terms of power) is reversed, and they won’t know anything of thousands of automobile fatalities in the U.S., but they do see their own children dying. So it’s a bit unrealistic to expect anybody to be able to somehow “globally contextualize” all the world’s suffering as somehow all worthy of their same personal concern as what they see immediately around them. Yes - I know, our media strives (rightly or wrongly) to help us feel that all suffering must have our immediate attention as being ‘immediately around us’.
But I’m not so sure this is a “hole” in our gospel. Let me suggest that there is a “the poor you will always have with you” principle in play. And that is this: Even if you were a powerful billionaire, you won’t be keeping all these world tragedies from happening. And violence, starvation, and death will still remain ever alarmingly present despite you’re grandest (even successful) efforts to slow down some of it. Believers here might say that Jesus was in a position to miraculously stop all suffering worldwide if he chose to do so. And yet he focused instead on those immediately around him. In fact, among the gospel narratives, one of the examples we see a generally abstracted ‘concern’ for giving to the poor is the obligatory indignation put into the mouth of Judas that “this expensive perfume could have been sold and the money given to the poor!” And the narrator goes on to inform us that Judas really cared nothing for all those poor. One gets the idea that this seemed like a proper caring thing to say, and that is the only reason Judas said it. We agonize for a bit about all the death in the world because it temporarily salves our consciences that we ourselves are in such pains about it … and then we go on about our day. Jesus, in contrast, doesn’t seem to want to let even a single good deed (of dubious effect against the mountain of need that yet remains) get lost in all this. The worldwide poor are always there - yes. But can you bless this poor person that you personally encountered today? Or … you can’t give enough to come close to making a dent in the war torn suffering or famine-induced starvation abroad. But can you give $10 or $100 toward a reputable charity that is at least helping with some of it? Our individual acts of environmental awareness won’t make a blip of difference on climate change, but can you make one loving choice that shows [because] you care about God’s creation today, and perhaps try to start making a habit of these things? Perfection (solving the problem of the poor who will always still be there) is forever out of your reach, but can you bless the one poor or suffering person who is within your reach to bless today? In that way, we might make it less about us and our own so-called ‘suffering’ of conscience, and make it more about at least obediently addressing what God puts in front of us to address.
Well, maybe he just raised his eyebrows a little.
)