Home Interests Versus Foreign Aid

I received this from a friend:

I'm still scratching my head at this one.

British Homeless go without eating.

British Elderly go without needed medicines.

British Mentally ill go without treatment.

British Troops go without proper equipment.

British Veterans go without benefits they were promised.

Yet we donate billions to other countries before helping our own first.

Have the guts to re-post this. 1% will re-post and 99% won't have the guts!!..

Having worked in poorer nations, I see the comments above as being relative, but have enough truth in them to make people respond, and respond negatively, which I assume is the purpose of the post.

I am reminded of the words of Mark 7: 25 - 30:

"Immediately a woman whose little daughter had an unclean spirit heard of him and came and fell down at his feet. Now the woman was a Gentile, a Syrophoenician by birth. And she begged him to cast the demon out of her daughter. And he said to her, “Let the children be fed first, for it is not right to take the children’s bread and throw it to the dogs.” But she answered him, “Yes, Lord; yet even the dogs under the table eat the children’s crumbs.” And he said to her, “For this statement you may go your way; the demon has left your daughter.” And she went home and found the child lying in bed and the demon gone."

Here we have a foreigner coming to Jesus asking for healing for her child. There are a few ways to interpret this story. The first being that once the 'children' are fed and full, then the dogs (the name for Gentiles i.e. foreigners) can be fed. Meaning that we look after our own first and then, when all are replete, we will turn our attention to the foreigners. The question here is, "Will we ever have enough for others?"

Another is that the children are being fed and so the dogs can eat what falls to the ground from their plenty. They realise that they aren't allowed at the table, but from the much that the children have, enough falls to provide also for them. The question here is, "Will we ever be good stewards of what we have or will we continue to be wasteful and profligate?"

Is this about us, or about others?

Why are homeless people homeless and what do we, and those who post the comments above, what do they do about the homeless? My experience is that they complain that not enough is being done by the welfare state rather than get involved. It becomes all about them and their actions (or inaction) and expectations of others doing something (after all, that's what we pay taxes for).

Drugs for the old? Aren't they in receipt of free prescriptions? Is this a statement of fact or just manipulative and sensationalising the situation for their own ends?

Mental Health issues? Working in this area (I'm a Vicar, it's what we do!) has shown me that we live in a society which tolerates the mentally ill badly, provides for them scantily and supports them woefully. But this is about more than money (although more would be useful)!

I have to say that the equipment situation is improving and it's more logistics than anything else that appears to be the problem a lot of the time (if what I'm told is true) rather than cash. I'd be more supportive if the reference was about establishment and manning!

I deal with a number of British Veterans and whilst I don't always think we honour the Covenant to the full, and whilst I see a great many errors and frustratingly awful procedural things, these are organisational rather than financially motivated. Lost files, stuffed up medical issues and the like rarely have anything to do with finances.

So I have posted the piece here.

Do you think we should feed our own first? Where do we start feeding others and being responsible for others in the global village that is the world?

Pax