大象传媒

From Leslie Griffiths, Methodist Minister:听听听听听听听

听It鈥檚 impossible to turn the television on these days without seeing crowds of people on the move. Last week the migrations were cause by floods in India and America. This week, it鈥檚 the tens of thousands of people fleeing from Burma into Bangladesh. It seems to get harder and harder to keep the human dimension of these tragedies alive 鈥� everything gets turned into politics or statistics. Men, women and children get lost under the sheer weight of numbers or events. And yet, I believe it鈥檚 important for us all to dig deep and to keep the human cost of these tragedies uppermost in our minds.

听This came home to me a few years ago when I was visiting my beloved Haiti just after a truly dreadful earthquake had struck in which a quarter of a million people perished, I was part of a group visiting one of the tented communities housing those who鈥檇 been displaced by the disaster and I remember trying to engage in conversation with the victims as they sat gloomily in their tents. But what do you say to such people? I remember one woman particularly 鈥� hunched on a simple stool, a child across her lap, her face drained of life, her body language resistant to interference by the likes of people like me. I asked her name. That seemed safe enough. She muttered something but I failed to understand. I repeated my question and, this time, I got it right. 鈥淒ieula,鈥� I said and, at that, a miracle occurred. Just hearing someone utter her name, the life came rushing back into her face, her eyes sparkled, she told me off for being so deaf the first time, we shared the joke. Someone who, to all intents and purposes, was dead had come alive again.

听I think of Dieula every time I see displaced people on the move. And I remember a word of Jesus too: each time you respond to the needs of anyone in distress, - the homeless, the hungry, people in prison, - you鈥檙e right on the button and in tune with what I鈥檓 all about; it鈥檚 as if you were doing it for me.听