3.29.2014 FAKE COMPASSION

editorial by joel belz in world magi zine, 4.5.14, p6

the question needs to be asked again and again:
why, when we need a little expression of compassion,
do we in such a knee jerk manner always turn to something as impersonal and soulless as the government?
(note: a thought..because being enslaved to our own desires we automatically become enslaved to whoever
or whatever seems to hold out to us who are looking to TAKE a proffered GIVE(?)....)

and why,
especially when we're engaged in gargantuan tussles in the areas of education, medical care and elder care,
do we yearn for source that by their very nature have heats o stone?
last week's news alone included stories of broken promises on al three fronts:
new york city's new mayor, bill de blasio, arbitrarily cut of support to charter schools.
the administrators of obamacare shamelessly changed major rules governing that embarrassing fiasco.
and p0ensioners in detroit and chicago found that their retirement benefits might well be
less than half what they had expected.
a list of betrayed commitments like those could be compiled for every issue of WORLD, every year.

A 'LOVING GOVERNMENT' IS AN OXYMORON
just show us one!
loving or compassionate governments are a contradiction in terms simply BECAUSE
GOVERNMENTS HAVE NOTHING OF THEIR OWN TO GIVE.
everything they might promise they must get first from others.
no government ever sacrifices.

parents can sacrifice.
they can stay with you after school to help you understand long division.
they can work all day saturday on a class fundraiser.
they can explain things, a little, when your girlfriend breaks up with you.

doctors and nurses can sacrifice.
they can meet you at 1 am to stitch up a lacerated chin.
your pediatrician can hang a sign on his office door that says,
'gone to ghana to help the children there' (as our doctor used to do once every year)
and leave a profound message for your children.

even families can sacrifice.
they can double up in their own rooms
to free one for grandpa who just had a stroke and isn't his old self
but would die an early death if put in a nursing home.
they can adjust their daily schedules to make loving room
for a sometimes-harD-to-understand oldster.

COMPASSION THAT IS NOT COSTLY TO ITS GIVER IS NO COMPASSION AT ALL.
love that demands nothing of its donor is only a cheap imitation of real love.
such truths, rooted in scripture, should remind us constantly how empty
is any trust that we place in governmental structures.

try this rule of thumb:
the farther you move from the individual orbit
and the closer you move to the big group,
the harder it is to find genuine compassion and sacrifice.
for almost as soon as we start assembling ourselves in bigger and bigger groups
(this goes 'spiritually'  for groups that designate themselves to be 'church')
the more we also start engaging in various kinds of 'risk aversion'.
discomforts we were quite ready to endure when we were alone
must now studiously and regularly be avoided.

examples abound.
new churches and little churches do their janitorial work on a volunteer basis;
megachurches hire sanitary engineering comp0anies.
teachers in one room schools put
Band Aids on the students themselves;
teachers in big schools send kids to the infirmary.
bosses in little companies regularly do things with and for their employees
that they tend to quit doing when the payroll extends to hundreds of people.

bigness, all by itself-not just in government, but anywhere
-tends to discourage sacrificial behavior.
that happens for a very simple reason.
only individuals or at biggest small groups of individuals,
actually have the resources needed to engage in sacrifice.
you can't sacrifice that which you don't own in the first place.

but it's not enough just to beat up on government and other big entities
for trying to do what they're not equipped to do.
we desperately need instead to get busy doing those things ourselves.
if the God-intended model is for persons, not super agencies,
to wrap their arms around little children and hurting patients and aging parents,
then let's go to it-person by person.

some will complain that they'd love to get involved
-except that the government go there first and is in the say.
of that the government has so drained our resources
that we have little to work with ourselves.
but such excuses are just that-excuses.
THE ESSENCE OF SACRIFICE IS THAT YOU'RE SO CONSUMED WITH THE OPPORTUNITY
THAT YOU DON'T EVEN NOTICE THE THINGS THAT MIGHT BE IN THE WAY.