As I related to Joan Butcher at our drop-in centre on Friday night I could not help wondering, "Why are we doing this?" You see I do not expect that Joan will change her destructive way of life. I think over the next year or so we will see Joan continue to drink stupidly, sleep out, addle her mind even more, go downhill health wise and eventually be found dead somewhere. On Friday night as I put my arm around Joan to try to listen to her drunken mumbling, I discovered she was absolutely soaked. She was very hungry and cold. In some ways it is her own stupid fault! Why should I care? I could list off a number of people that we have contact with through our drop-in who will go in a similar way. I have known Terry for over 20 years. He was an alcoholic, gambling addict and hoarder when I first met him and he still is today. I have helped him move house several times. We have a funny sort of friendship but he is, I suspect, never going to change and his lifestyle is slowly taking its toll on his body. There is another named Dave who is getting close to the end of his journey. There are a few that I have seen change and we may be able to say we had a little bit to do with their growth and progress, but most go from crisis to crisis until they eventually die. Why waste time and effort on them?
I got to thinking about Mother Teresa and her movement. They would pick dying patients off the streets of Calcutta, take them to somewhere more comfortable and nurse them until they died. Her rationale was that they were to her, "Christ" and she was giving them love. It did not change their predicament, they still died, but they were treated with love in their dying. That's what I am doing with the Joans, Terrys and Daves of this world. I am trying to treat them with respect, empathy, friendship and love as they travel their journey. They of course have other friends who treat them with love, but I see it as my task to be there as a supportive "brotherly" presence, representing as best I am able, God's loving presence to them as they cope with life. It is my call to see them as God's children, my brothers and sisters and to try my best to treat them in that way. This does not mean I give them anything they ask for. They know my disappointment with their choices, and also that I am not a soft touch for drink or drug money. I am, by now, fairly street-wise and know the angles they will try. Most now have given up trying to con me. But may I never stop being their friend.
That's what I have been stewing on over the last day or so, and those are the things I am reminding myself of.
More from my graffiti board poster..
"It will be a great day when our schools get all the money they need,
and the air force has to run a cake stall to buy a plane."
"Don't hesitate to ask dumb questions,
they are easier to handle than dumb mistakes."
"Worry is like a rocking horse,
you go backwards and forwards
but it gets you nowhere."
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