|
"We, as human beings, are wonderfully, and complexly, made. We have the potential to do great things. Our imaginations stir our capacities to build spaceships, to transplant hearts, to communicate, instantaneously, with people, all around the globe, and even to love one another.
We are, also, created with considerable fragility and vulnerability. Even the strongest among us experience great fragility due to illnesses or physical limitations; some because of a susceptibility to electrical shorts and biochemical imbalances in our brains that affect our whole being.
Whatever our frailties, what we need most, during these times, is true care and compassion…not the distorted kind peddled by politicians trying to garner the votes of the gullible…but something much deeper. Care at its root meaning, from the Gothic word kara, means to lament, to grieve, to experience sorrow, and to cry out with. We ourselves have known the experience of receiving this kind of care when others have gently and courageously walked with us on the hard parts of the journey and helped bear our pain.
But true care and compassion can never be simply an individual matter! It must also involve a communal response…a visionary, thoughtful and comprehensive public initiative taken by the whole community on behalf of its members who are most vulnerable. This initiative must address fundamental needs such as: decent housing in safe neighborhoods, an adequate income to meet the true costs of living, barrier-free access to quality health care, availability of comprehensive and user-friendly mental health care, and opportunities for socialization, meaningful activity and work.
Instead of our self-congratulatory pride in having provided a so-called safety net for vulnerable people, let us claim rightful pride in creating a true structure of support that keeps people from falling into that net in the first place. What we need is not mere charity, but more justice…much more justice!
Imagine with me for a moment that we in this circle are committed to the creation of a just, living, vibrant community comprised of many kinds of people. What all these people have in common is that they are wonderfully and complexly made and all are susceptible to the conditions of suffering that befall the human race.
Now imagine that a small but significant percentage of individuals in this community suffer extraordinarily from an illness that causes them to experience severely impaired thinking, feeling and functioning, thus requiring extra care to meet their most basic needs.
What would this community look like, particularly through the eyes of those facing such challenges and suffering? Where would we have them live and sleep…on sidewalks, under bridges, in shelters, in the jails? Where would they eat…out of dumpsters, waiting in long lines at soup kitchens and at food banks? What work or meaningful activities would we make available to them…panhandling on the street corners, seeking a place to relieve themselves? And how accessible would we make needed mental health care…would it be necessary to become a danger to oneself or someone else before help would arrive?
I had the great privilege of visiting the town of Geel in Belgium this past year. For the past 800 years this community of people has put compassion into action by hospitably and humanely caring for seriously mentally ill people from all over Belgium. Drawing its vision from the legend of Saint Dymphna, the patron saint of the mentally ill, Geel has created a comprehensive system of care that brings people with mental illness into the life of the community, not shuts them out. In Geel and its surrounding area, hundreds of these individuals live in foster family homes, participating in the life of the family, and often staying there for the remainder of their lives. In addition there is a system of support for the foster families and their mentally ill members, which includes regular home visits by social workers, financial and emotional support, drop-in centers for activities and socialization, and ready access to other outpatient services and to inpatient psychiatric care. And most significantly, the ordinary citizens of Geel treat mentally ill people as fellow-citizens, not as outcasts.
The Geel tradition only serves to highlight the absolute disgrace and travesty of our own experience in this country where hundreds of thousands of already deeply suffering people are left to scrap for survival on the streets. Neglect, benign or otherwise, is still neglect. We must change our course and work proactively to build a true system of care. As it's said in the movies, “If you build it, they will come.” May our consciences be seared, our souls shaken and our resolve be renewed to exercise compassion individually and communally like we've never done before. We have the potential to do great things.
God help us!"
– Ken Kraybill
Speech given at Candlelight vigil for Homeless Mentally Ill
St. Mark's Cathedral – Seattle
11/28/00
Thanks to Some of Our Partners and Suppliers:
|
