Care is something other than cure. Cure means "change." A doctor, a lawyer, a minister, a social worker-they all want to use their professional skills to bring about changes in people's lives. They get paid for whatever kind of cure they can bring about. But cure, desirable as it may be, can easily become violent, manipulative, and even destructive if it does not grow out of care. Care is being with, crying out with, suffering with, feeling with. Care is compassion. It is claiming the truth that the other person is my brother or sister, human, mortal, vulnerable, like I am. Henri J.M. Nouwen's Bread for the Journey.
Over the last few days I've been watching the Live 8 DVDs and was caught by one moment when Bob Geldof explained the origins of Live Aid in the response to famine and crisis in replaying a 20 year old video. It ended pausing on this starving little girl. He said something like 'Don't let people tell you that you can't make a difference! You can." There appeared on stage that child grown up into a young woman.
We all hope to and I want to leave something behind in this world. I don't have a spouse nor a family but I want to make a difference. So often it isn't by doing anything but simply listening. My heart hurts when hear the pain of someone and I know I can do nothing but listen and pray with them. In that moment there is hope - I pray there is hope.
That perches in the soul,
And sings the tune--without the words,
And never stops at all,
And sweetest in the gale is heard;
And sore must be the storm
That could abash the little bird
That kept so many warm.
I've heard it in the chillest land,
And on the strangest sea;
Yet, never, in extremity,
It asked a crumb of me.
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