Wednesday, September 24, 2003

violence
I hate it
have lived with it for years

It freezes the soul
It hurts both
It leaks fear
It bleeds love

A day of contrasts. Talking about beautiful things like the soul being scratched ....... read this as an example of the centre of a human
" becoming"

Wisdom did not come
with the flower
in the spring
or with the hot dust
blowing around the stray paths
in the summer or with the lifting of the leaf
in the calm autumn wind
But in the cold winter
when food was short
fire was low
and night was long

by Mir Mahfuz Ali

.........beautiful ....... the words of a YMCA Resident who is, like them all, much more than that.

As we talked this stuff and more came violence. Just like that word VIOLENCE jumps up to spoil a sentence ...... so comes human violence, one with another, one to another.
And we all share the pain. The pain of being in a community and feeling the disturbance
unease
uncomfortableness
fear
pain
hate ............... of violence ...................as much as you want to love the sinner and not the sin.

An issue with YMCA's, not new, is
1 do we accommodate as many people we can with massive needs
or
2 do we accommodate a less number and work with them to aid their wholistic development beyond meeting the basic needs of food and shelter. Ensuring that we retain a climate of trust where all have an opportunity to develop.

You can tell where I am coming from.

The Government pays grants, of course, that we may accommodate and support people but do not pay grant aid to YMCAs' to fulfill it's mission of seeking the Kingdom of God ..... and striving that that Kingdom, takes residence inside the souls of Staff, Residents, Volunteers, Members and Board Members etc..
Martin Luther King did NOT say
"I have a budget"
He did say
"I have a dream"
a mission
a vision......................

In the bleak mid-winter.................