Last month my wife and I were awakened at 2:30 a.m. on a Sunday by the sound of our oldest dog, Cory, who is a 13-year-old Sheltie, collapsing on the floor in our bedroom. After we tended him for a while and realized that his condition was grave, Mary Sue scooped him up and drove him to an all-night vet clinic. There he was X-rayed. Blood was drawn. The doctors offered to perform exploratory surgery to see if there was a blockage somewhere in his abdomen. We declined. Cory stayed in the intensive care unit of that clinic for two days. After an investment of about $1,000, Cory’s outlook brightened and we were able to take him back home.
Later that same morning I stood in the pulpit of my church to launch a series on how followers of Jesus should respond to people trapped in poverty.
The irony was not lost on me that there are more hospitals and clinics for pets in the state of Indiana than there are hospitals and clinics for people on the entire continent of Africa. The combined economies of all 48 sub-Saharan African countries are about the same as the city of Chicago. About one half of the world’s 6.3 billion people live on less than $2 a day. Approximately 30,000 children age five and under die every day from preventable diseases and starvation.
I told Cory’s story that morning as an illustration of the fact that our family has the means and the motivation to put him into the hands of a professional caregiver with no notice whatsoever, whereas myriad people around the world are likely never to see a doctor even once in their lives.
After the service, a number of worshippers wanted to talk with me. Most of them asked about…our dog. “We truly hope Cory is all right.” “I know what it’s like to have an old friend like that go through so much pain.” Their comments were touching and sincere.
I think, if I had been in their shoes, I might have offered the same sympathy and good wishes. Our family, after all, loves animals. We have three other dogs and five cats. We are convinced that their lives are not trivial. Nevertheless, the contrast could not have been more dramatic. On a Sunday in which we sought to raise our mutual awareness of the fragility of so many human lives, we found it far easier to express our concern for a pet. Wrapping our minds around the reality of global suffering proved to be a seriously difficult task.
Several times in recent weeks we have stayed up late at night waiting for “prodigal cats” to return home. We fret that they may have ended up on a local coyote’s menu. I must admit that I have prayed for their return, asking God to spare us the sadness of a burial or a never-ending missing cat story. In each case they have materialized a day or so later. They generally reward our shouts of joy by wearing the expression that you only see on a cat’s face: “whatever.”
Meanwhile there are countless parents around the world who wait, pray, and anguish over their missing children. International Justice Mission reports that millions of young girls have been kidnapped from their barrios or villages and forced into prostitution. They are particularly vulnerable because they are poor. They are raped several times each day by sex tourists or pedophiles. In the most desperate situations, the life expectancy for these children after kidnapping is about five years.
Those tragedies are so heartbreaking that I don’t know how to respond. I don’t even know where to start. I don’t know whom to trust. I’m afraid of being drowned by guilt feelings, but just as leery of ending up jaded, cynical, or insulated because my predictably comfortable life allows me to look the other way.
There’s no retreat into the safe haven of personal spirituality, however. When we open our Bibles we discover that there are 2,003 verses on the subject of poverty – second only in number to verses concerning salvation and redemption. What God has to say about poverty and injustice is not a Republican issue. It is not a Democratic issue. It is a matter of asking what God would have us do whenever we pray those words in the Lord’s prayer – “may your will be done on earth as it is in heaven,” and, “give us this day our daily bread” – and realize that we ourselves must be the answer to that prayer for many other people.
I’m learning that it’s possible to make compelling, personal responses to the world’s most painful dilemmas. I can change the way I live. I can change the way I pray. I can partner with credible organizations that are making a difference just down the street and in the darkest corners of the world. I can wrestle with the tough questions as to how God wants to leverage my affluence to bless others.
Meanwhile, I keep hearing that other question: How's Cory doing? The answer is that he's still hanging in there. I'm glad we were able to pass along to our kids a respect for the lives of God's creatures. But my deepest hope is that they would far exceed their father's late-blooming commitment to the lives of so many fellow human beings whose pain is so much more profound. The exciting news is that the more we seek to embody genuine love and care for desperately hurting people, the closer we get to the heart of the One who lived and died for them all.
