Modern-Day Lepers ~ The Homeless

Greetings Dear Reader,

Almost every weekday I pass a spot where a few homeless people gather.  There is some shelter nearby for the cold nights and their few belongings are untouched during the day.  On sunny days there are tables where they sit when they are not searching for food.

Many people pass this area moving between the office buildings that are adjacent to the plaza.  I sat at one of the empty tables one afternoon enjoying a rare free hour of lunch and sunshine.  I observed that as people traversed the plaza they moved to avoid proximity to the table where the homeless men sat. 

I spent the hour watching as people in nice clothes carrying premium coffee and freshly purchased lunches carved a wide berth between themselves and men who obviously were in need.  On that warm spring day it saddened me deeply.

I spent a second day at the table observing.  During my lunch hour I counted the number of people who passed the table.  It was over two hundred.  If each of them were to donate a dollar to the needs of these me each day (less than the price of their artisan coffee each day) these men would be able to eat and be healthier.  I am not saying that this is the answer.  It is just an example.

The homeless, in public are modern day lepers to us.  I will not say how I have responded to this need I have observed.  It is not my place to talk about what I do.  The Father sees it and that is enough.  I will say that like the priest and judge on the road to Samaria I see too many people pass by “on the other side of the road”. 

I cannot say how to address the problem of homelessness.  I can say that if everyone did a little it would have a massive impact.  If we found a way to think of them less as untouchable and more and humans that deserve our love and kindness it could change things.  None of them started out with a dream to live on the streets begging for bread.  Let that sink in whilst you listen to a great song from Men at Work.

Touching the Untouchables – Men at Work

Hello to you, my sweet young friends

Have you got money perhaps you could lend?

I wash my leather face in the afternoon sun

My shirt's turn my time's near done

Touching the untouchables but they don't know

Respect the disrespectable's, but in the end you know

You turn away, what can I say?

Spend my nights in the telephone booth

I make sure I leave the phone off the hook

There are no Jones' and I pay no rent

I have to stand straight because my back's so bent

Tell my secretary I ain't takin' any calls,

And if you want to find me, just ask the boys

Down at the wall that's where I'll be

Oh

Oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh

Park bench and cigarettes

Can you help me get off this fence?

Can't you see, I'm just an old man

Tryin' hard, do what I can

Touching the untouchables but they don't know

Respect the disrespectable's, but in the end you know

You turn away, what can I say?

You'll never, never know

You'll never know

Wishing you joy in the journey,

Aramis Thorn

Mat 13:52 So Jesus said to them, "That is why every writer who has become a disciple of Christ’s rule of the universe is like a home owner. He liberally hands out new and old things from his great treasure store.”

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