I went to meet Katrina victims today. There is a church in town in my fellowship that has been, and will continue to feed refugees until either they all leave or they cannot at all. I talked to one guy, 80 years old. He was a great guy at one point he started to tear up, I held his hand. I know that sounds very tuesday's with Morrie, but he wasn't affraid of physical contact. While sitting at the table he would brush my hand. He talked about his anniversery in a few days, 60 years, he and I talked about plumming, he was a plummer for 30 some odd years after getting out of the Navy.
With other guys when I didn't know what to talk about I asked them how to make Gumbo. I have never tried to make gumbo and am thinking of trying. I can't start learning to Barbeque yet because I don't want to buy a smoker until I find somewhere more permanant. The basics of making things like these generally aren't difficult, but it is the minutia that makes them award winning.
it was very difficult for me though, do you bring it up or not bring it up, do you ask if their house is up or down. What do you do if they don't respond well at all. In a counseling setting it is different because there is a reason they are there, however in this setting I am approaching them, someone they never met, to support them.
On another note, a friend and I were talking about why they name hurricanes. I think it is because it is easier to hate something we anthropomorphize. We can't hate nature, but we can be angry at mother nature. We can't hate a hurricane because it doesn't care, unless we think of it as a person. If we think of it as a person, it isn't just about the wind and the rain, it is what Katrina did to us. It is Katrina's fault people are out of work, it is Katrina's fault gas prices are up. And also if we blaim Katrina we don't have to blaim God.
What do you think? anyone who may read? why do we Anthropomorphize (give unhuman things human traits, like names, or like saying it sees us comming) things like this? We could I dentify them with letters or numbers. But we give them names. Do you think it goes all the way back to the ancient near east where if you name something you have power over it?
God Bless all the people working in relief, and if your not and you can be, I hope God inflicts you with trials that force you to need your fellow human.
2 comments:
God bless the people so that they may not need the relief that they are needing now. Unfortunately, it is people who care not for the daily waste of life within the American Dream that makes this Nightmare an inevitability.
My question to all, where was your care and concern BEFORE Katrina. Where was your care and concern BEFORE the Tsunami. etc, etc. There is much to directive, "leave the dead to bury the dead".
I think tis time that the people learn how to fish so that it is not they we are fishing out of the receding tides of what might have just been, if we cared enough prior to a disaster, a passing cloud. This they can do by addressing the evils of the system that in many ways and every day makes vicitms of the slave class. Think. How many have died as a result of the capitalist system within the country on a daily basis and compare it to Katrina. It's time to rethink the American Dream lest we have need for our nets yet again in the future.
Justin,
Right on the money as usual. I think the name gives it a human quality as well as a "controlling" quality (plus, history wouldn't remember hurricane 928382 as well as it would Katrina).
I think that if I were speaking to the refugees there, if I weren't sure, I'd just listen. No questions, just be there for them. With time they will disclose what they need from you and allow you the chance to aid them. Sometimes it's enough to "just be there" for them while meeting their material needs in the short term. Keep up the work of the Kingdom and if you have any specific "mission" going on there that we can help you with in the way of donations let me know. (By that I mean a work being sponsored by the local churches instead of the larger organizations -- I trust your efforts will use what we can provide in the best manner possible).
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