THE CAGED CHILDREN WAIL

                                                    

Unlike in the aftermath of the Second World War when the displaced peoples of Europe where cared for by the victorious Allies through various programs, such as the Marshal plan and programs by NGOs, which helped people either re-establish themselves in the home country, return to their country of origin, or be accepted as new citizens in Allied Nations, we have these past many, many years failed to efficiently, compassionately address the millions of displaced people, displaced by oppressive violence, civil wars, famine, lack of work with which to earn a living and thereby raise a family.

Mostly from African and Middle Eastern countries, Europe is inundated; mostly from Central America, but increasingly from South America as well as the Caribbean, the United States is facing a tsunami of people, desperate, frightened people, not unlike Europe; Canada, triggered by a frankly ill-conceived statement by the Prime Minister, is experiencing – like the US and Europe but so far on a dramatically smaller scale – a river of the desperate illegally crossing the border.

This global influx of desperate people – men, women, children, has no disciplined order to it, thus the thousands who drown in the Mediterranean, the women and children trafficked by the evil men who sell vulnerable human beings, the small but no less dangerous numbers of criminals and terrorists who mingle with the desperate and then disappear within our countries, not to surface until they rob, rape, do an act of terror – is unending.

Even the most charitable of citizens in the countries inundated by this flood of desperate people are feeling the strain and demanding governments get some control over things, while on the one extreme the disingenuous liberal mindset wants a world without borders – which will be a world without any rule of law or common sense – and on the other extreme the rightist mindset wants everyone deemed not to be like us, sent packing.

President Trump, both in a tweet and a recent speech is adamant he does not want his country “infected” by illegal immigrants.

This reveals a not uncommon attitude which fails to see frightened, desperate, of perhaps a skin colour, language, religion not like us, as human beings, as children of God, just as we are.

Do not oppress and act ungodly toward the resident alien, the orphan or the widow. [Jer. 22:3] Do not rob the poor because they are poor, nor crush the needy at the gate…[Prv.22;22] Father of the fatherless, defender of widows—God in his holy abode, God gives a home to the forsaken…[Ps.68:6,7] The prayer of the lowly pierces the clouds; it does not rest till it reaches its goal; Nor will it withdraw till the Most High responds…[Sir.35:21]

Then the king will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father. Inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, a stranger and you welcomed me, naked and you clothed me, ill and you cared for me, in prison and you visited me.’  Then the righteous will answer him and say, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink? When did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you? When did we see you ill or in prison, and visit you?’ And the king will say to them in reply, ‘Amen, I say to you, whatever you did for one of these least brothers of mine, you did for me.’” [Mt.25:34ff]

It is from the above words of God we must, as Christians, using the power of love’s creative, compassionate imagination, work individually, as communities, as voice for the voiceless to push the body politic and world leaders to seriously address, at their source, the wars, unemployment, famine, epidemics, violent oppression of people which forces thousands upon thousands of our brothers and sisters to risk everything to flee to countries they deem safe, welcoming.

We cannot ignore the thousands of bodies floating in the Mediterranean, be deaf to the wailing of the more than 2,000 children being held in cages, separated from their parents who are caged elsewhere in the United States – protecting our borders, seeking to prevent illegal immigration should not be at the cost of traumatizing little children.

When the AIDS epidemic seemed unstoppable scientists around the world worked tirelessly to find Patient Zero, in a word where did it start; when Ebola was ravaging African nations, the same thing was done: find the source and work backward from the source to find a cure.

We need to follow the trail of bodies from our borders back to where this massive movement of populations unfolds, find the triggers, address the triggers – for like after WWII when the clear majority of those displaced by the war just wanted to return to their homeland, so would most of the current displaced peoples return to their homeland if the causes of their leaving could be addressed and eliminated.

In his 2017 Christmas homily Pope Francis teaches us: …..Mary and Joseph found themselves forced to set out. They had to leave their people, their home and their land, and to undertake a journey in order to be registered in the census. This was no comfortable or easy journey for a young couple about to have a child: they had to leave their land. At heart, they were full of hope and expectation because of the child about to be born; yet their steps were weighed down by the uncertainties and dangers that attend those who have to leave their home behind……So many other footsteps are hidden in the footsteps of Joseph and Mary. We see the tracks of entire families forced to set out in our own day. We see the tracks of millions of persons who do not choose to go away but, driven from their land, leave behind their dear ones. In many cases this departure is filled with hope, hope for the future; yet for many others this departure can only have one name: survival. Surviving the Herods of today, who, to impose their power and increase their wealth, see no problem in shedding innocent blood.

Towards the end of the film The Day After Tomorrow, after in the film the entire northern hemisphere has been plunged into a new ice age and the survivors, who have lost everything except their lives, flee south: the character of the President says: “The fact that my first address to you comes from a consulate on foreign soil…is a testament to our changed reality. Not only Americans…but people all around the globe are now guests in the nations…we once called the Third World. In our time of need, they have taken us in and sheltered us.”

If we keep rejecting our brothers and sisters today, fleeing towards the north, how shall we be received should the day come when we must flee south?

MOST ALONE TIME

                                                          

Last week the media repeatedly re-told the stories of two recent suicides by celebrities, mostly stating that “she died, he died”, when the tragic fact is she killed herself, he killed himself.

The moment immediately prior to the act itself must be the most alone time for any human being. It is the moment when the mind is filled with poisoned thinking and lies, the emotions are in profound darkness and hopelessness, and in that aloneness the yearning to be freed from the pain disables rational thought and the weakened will chooses to stop the pain, without the person having any prior experience of the finality of their action, for death is a one of.

Once the act is done it is final.

Time we avoid the almost banal word: suicide and name it truthfully: self-murder.

There was a time, before the development of modern psychiatry, when it was assumed self-murder was a purely free-will act.

The openness of the Church to what can be learned over the ages from greater understanding of human emotions, impact of trauma upon a person’s ability to endure physical and emotional pain, put an end to the erroneous understanding of self-murder always being a purely free-will act.

That said in our day the issue has become complicated by, in Canada for example, the legalization of doctor assisted self-murder.

Truly we are deep in the cold darkness of the culture of death.

Often there is intense social pressure, lack of a vibrant social life, in the lives of individuals who act alone to self-murder, while often familial pressure, upon the infirm and the elderly forces them to chose assisted self-murder.

The Church teaches: Everyone is responsible for his life before God who has given it to him. It is God who remains the sovereign Master of life. We are obliged to accept life gratefully and preserve it for His honour and the salvation of our souls. We are stewards, not owners, of the life God has entrusted to us. It is not ours to dispose of……[Catechism of the Catholic Church #2280]

At the same time the Church takes compassionate note of the fact that: Grave psychological disturbances, anguish, or grave fear of hardship, suffering, or torture can diminish the responsibility of the one committing suicide. We should not despair of the eternal salvation of persons who have taken their own lives. By ways known to Him alone, God can provide the opportunity for salutary repentance. the Church prays for persons who have taken their own lives. [see op. cit. paras: 2282,83]

St. John Paul II reminds us: To concur with the intention of another person to commit suicide and to help in carrying it out through so-called "assisted suicide" means to cooperate in, and at times to be the actual perpetrator of, an injustice which can never be excused, even if it is requested. In a remarkably relevant passage Saint Augustine writes that "it is never licit to kill another: even if he should wish it, indeed if he requests it because, hanging between life and death, he begs for help in freeing the soul struggling against the bonds of the body and longing to be released; nor is it licit even when a sick person is no longer able to live". …. euthanasia must be called a false mercy, and indeed a disturbing "perversion" of mercy. True "compassion" leads to sharing another's pain; it does not kill the person whose suffering we cannot bear. [cf. The Gospel of Life, Ch. III, para. 66]

No government can morally legislate any laws which contravene Divine Law, therefore such laws require Christians, indeed everyone who acknowledges or at least knows of Divine Law, to disobey such ersatz laws.

When it comes to human beings, as acting persons we have free will.

 Killing ourselves is the ultimate abuse of the freedom gifted to us.

 If the decision has already been made it is well nigh impossible to prevent because such of our brothers and sisters who have made the decision tend to be extremely capable of keeping their choice hidden until family and friends are left with the profound pain of not having prevented death.

The violation of charity which is constitutive of self-murder is made visible in the survivors, family and friends, blaming themselves for something NOT their fault.

The command of Jesus to love one another as we love ourselves should compel us to act if we notice someone we love, family, co-worker, neighbour, suddenly, for example, giving away personal treasured items, speaking ways not part of their normal discourse, revealing they are depressed, overly anxious, lacking hope, posting hints on social media.

Our loving, compassionate action may well prevent another tragedy.

Charity is the total self-gift to other remembering: “If I give a little, it costs a lot. Give a lot, it costs a little. Give everything, it costs nothing at all.” {word of Melkite Archbishop Joseph Raya [1916-2005]}

A major contributing factor to self-murder, or assisted self-murder, is as a society we have forgotten the difference between pain and suffering.

So much so that in 1984, seeking to remind us of the difference, St. John Paul II wrote an apostolic letter: Salvifici Doloris [On the Christian Meaning of Human Suffering]: …..interior maturity and spiritual greatness in suffering are certainly the result of a particular conversion and cooperation with the grace of the Crucified Redeemer. It is he himself who acts at the heart of human sufferings through his Spirit of truth, through the consoling Spirit. It is he who transforms, in a certain sense, the very substance of the spiritual life, indicating for the person who suffers a place close to himself. …… Suffering is, in itself, an experience of evil. But Christ has made suffering the firmest basis of the definitive good, namely the good of eternal salvation. By his suffering on the Cross, Christ reached the very roots of evil, of sin and death…… ….slowly but effectively, Christ leads into this world, into this Kingdom of the Father, suffering man, in a certain sense through the very heart of his suffering. For suffering cannot be transformed and changed by a grace from outside, but from within. And Christ through his own salvific suffering is very much present in every human suffering and can act from within that suffering by the powers of his Spirit of truth, his consoling Spirit. [op. cit. Ch. VI, para: 26]

Pain is treatable, both physical and emotional pain, while the suffering aspect of pain is a gift to embraced, in and with Christ.

Let us not however forget that it is an act of authentic self-love to avail ourselves of any moral means to ease pain.

People who self-murder do not opt per se for death as much as they opt for an end to the pain.

…..although our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day. For this momentary light affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to what is seen but to what is unseen; for what is seen is transitory, but what is unseen is eternal. [2 Cor. 4:16-18]

Jesus said, “I have come that they might have life and have it abundantly” (John 10:10).

Let us pray for our brothers and sisters who are in the most alone moment that they will hear Jesus knocking at the door of their being [cf.Rev.3:20], open to Him, allow Him to fill them with His light and love.