Monthly Archives: July 2008

Consider

Don’t worry – be happy.

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This is just one of those things you just have to share.

I was speaking to a friend of mine who had been off work sick; I was glad to see her out and about and looking good. Appearances, as it turned out, were deceiving.

She had had a nasty flu and on top of that had picked up a virus that has damaged her heart to the point she needs a transplant. She is on the waiting list for a heart and transplant surgery.

Let me digress for a moment and say this is why I have always signed the documents for organ donation and made sure family and friends know I strongly believe in organ donation. Donated organs literally save lives. If you have not signed for organ donation please do.

Anyway my friend shared something that struck me as quite funny in a weird, somewhat twisted way and had my friend hastening to tell me how well everyone had treated her.

They had told her to go home and not to stress about it.

You heart has been damaged, you need a new heart, you are on the waiting list for a heart – should one become available, you would then undergo heart transplant surgery and … oh yes, don’t stress about any of this life/death stuff.

Life versus death, but don’t worry – kick back and be happy. Bizarre.

Homeless

She should not be homeless

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There is a woman who volunteers on Wednesday evenings to help prepare, serve and clean up after the meal for the homeless and other hungry citizens of Abbotsford.

Last week she was not at her best because she had just lost her home to fire. But this week she was back helping with dinner although she is now living in her car.

She is living in her car because, like far to many others, she has a very limited budget which sets severe limits on what she has to spend for rent and has been unable to find any place within her budget.

Governments can come up with whatever plans they want to help people find housing, people can utter whatever platitudes they want about “they’re homeless because they want to be” but the reality of homelessness for many is that there simply is no places available at a price they can afford.

And while that is a reality that politicians and the public need to recognize it is not the reason I sat down to share this story.

I am writing it because the homeless have expressed to me their belief, their concern that it is not healthy (in a variety of ways) for this woman to be living in her car and their anger that nobody in the Christian community of which she is a part is stepping forward to find or offer her a place to stay, even temporarily.

I leave it to you to ponder what it says about Abbotsford as a community that it is the homeless who are upset about the fact this disabled, not young woman is forced to live in her car while the rest of the community seemingly ignores her plight.

Consider

Appalled

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It is a sad comment about the state of our society has that I was not surprised by the news report I was watching, although I was disgusted.

When you advocate for the homeless, the addicted and the mentally ill you learn just how uncaring and wilfully ignorant society can be.

But listening to the comments of motorists and the mayor of North Vancouver left me appalled.

To deal with a suicidal woman police closed the Ironworkers Memorial Bridge to traffic, causing gridlock and inconveniencing thousands of drivers. Leading to calls for “new protocols” so the motoring public will not be inconvenienced by the actions needed to save a human life from suicide.

When and how did we as a society become so narcissistic, self-centered and “it is all about me” that a human life is not worth a few hours of inconvenience for motorists, even several thousand motorists?

And just how frightening for the future of society is it that the news report treated this as just a story, never asking the question of whether a human life is not worth a little, or even a lot of, inconvenience?