This week’s online edition Newsweek carries an article entitled, “I’m 60, single and childless. I worry who will care for me.” That kind of question plagues many, and I wonder if the lack of community, the kind we find in churches, makes it especially poignant. In her description of caring for her parents, there is no mention of a church community.
The church traditionally assumed the care of those who had no family. But the church is a family, a community of care. In some evangelical churches, members refer to each other as “brother” or “sister.” And the members care for the sick as we are told to do by various New Testament writers. The church is a family with all its various family issues as well as family care.
I’m tempted to write this person and suggest that she look for a church, that she become part of a church, a community that embraces all and care for all. NO one should be alone or feel alone when a community of love and care is probably just around the corner.
Prayer for the Day
We come humbly before you, O Lord, who bestows your mercy upon us. We know we have not always acted as your children should, We have abused your name by using it as an excuse for war,
We have not loved as you have told us to love,
Teach us, O Lord, to walk in your ways and to know your peace
Through living and loving faithfully.
In the name of the One who came to show us your peace,
Even Christ Jesus our Lord, Amen.
Thoughts for the Day
We have all known the long loneliness and we have learned that the only solution is love and that love comes with community
- Dorothy Day, social activist (1897-1980)
We live in a community of people not so that we can suppress and dominate each other or make each other miserable but so that we can better and more reliably satisfy all life's healthy needs.
- William Reich, American psychologist (1897-1957)
Two are better than one; because they have a good reward for their toil. For if they fall, one will lift up the other; but woe to one who is alone and falls and does not have another to help.
Ecclesiastes 4: 9-10