Wednesday 21 August 2013

Help the weak

Above: Photo of late 19th-early 20th century workhouse girls
in the Southwell Union Workhouse museum
Below right: one of the dormitories in the workhouse

There was universal condemnation recently of a British lawyer who called a 13 year-old girl a sexual predator during the trial of a 41 year-old man who had abused her. The act may have been consensual, but it wasn’t responsible on the man’s part. She was vulnerable, seeking attention and love; sometimes we have a duty to say no.

In other trials defence lawyers were accused of harassing rape victims, regardless of their feelings; one witness committed suicide after her courtroom ordeal. There were also reports about cyber bullying and a lack of care and compassion in some hospitals. Such stories offend human sensibilities, and if there is one indisputable and universal rule of social conduct in the Bible, it’s that vulnerable people are to be protected. The strong are to care for the weak.

We’re all vulnerable
The list of vulnerable people is long: children; teenagers pushing boundaries; elderly, sick and infirm people; physically and mentally disabled people; unemployed people (there are 2.5m unemployed in the UK and not enough suitable jobs to go round); people on low incomes facing rent, fuel and transport price rises; people who lose out to unscrupulous scammers. If you think of more, add them in the comments box below.

Then add yourself, because we’re all vulnerable. Not just at low spots in our lives, but we’re liable to make mistakes and errors of judgment at any time. That fact is at the heart of the Christian message. God knew our spiritual vulnerability and sent his Son to give us fresh starts and fresh strength: “Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous person,” Paul argues, “but God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:7-8).

The apostles were in no doubt about the implications: “Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another” (1 John 4:11). A care-less Christian is a contradiction in terms.

Survival of the weakest
There have always been ruthless people who trample on others to gain wealth or power. The biblical narrative recognises this from the beginning, and makes clear provision to curb its excesses. Competition is fine in sport, but in society all are born equal; selfishness spawns suffering, competition creates corruption.

There was no civic welfare system in the ancient world. (Indeed, there was virtually none except the workhouse in the UK until the “welfare state” was introduced in the mid 1940s; one such is pictured right.) So people most at risk – widows, orphans and disabled people with no male supporter, and immigrants who had settled in the land (called “aliens” or “strangers” in some Bibles) – were singled out for special care from the wider family and community. Those who failed to care were said to be subject to God’s judgement. References are below.

Jesus demonstrated his compassion for marginalised people in his miracles and teaching. He promoted the protection of children, and threatened their users and abusers with judgement. He castigated posh people who neglected the poor. The mid-20th century American spiritual writer, A.W. Tozer, pointedly remarked, “The Pharisees were bad not because they entertained their friends but because they would not entertain the poor and the common” people.1 

In the early church the first “order” of ministers (deacons), apart from the generally-recognised apostles, was not to feed the soul but the body, forming a structured welfare service for needy members (Acts 6:1-6). The New Testament is littered with injunctions to act kindly and share compassionately. There is just one cautionary note. Then, as now, a minority tried to take advantage of other people’s generosity. The solution was neither to despise needy people and label everyone as scroungers, nor to withdraw benefits, but to create what was then a culturally appropriate form of means testing (1 Timothy 5:9-16).

An obligation, not an option
In the Bible care for vulnerable people is an obligation, not an option; a priority, not an afterthought. Then, of course, charity did begin at home, with extended family and clan members obliged to shoulder responsibility for sometimes distant relatives, but the wider community chipped in too. In today’s different social environment we can’t shunt all welfare needs onto smaller and fragmented family units; community responsibility remains. We are our brothers’ keepers.

Throughout history Christians have been at the forefront of charitable support. They still are. For example, Green Pastures provides accommodation for 450 homeless people around the UK and has just announced its desire to encourage every church to have a house for homeless people.2 The Trussell Trust which oversees food banks, many of them staffed and supported by church members, claims 13m people in Britain live below the poverty line and in 2012-13 has provided emergency supplies for 346,992 people of whom 126,889 were children.3 Currently the Archbishop of Canterbury is encouraging local churches to help to develop more credit unions so that people on the edge of survival can avoid exorbitant pay-day loan companies and sharks4.

The needs are as great as ever, but the attitudes of many people, Christians and some parts of the media and government included, seem to have hardened, perhaps because of the stress of coping with recession themselves. When the UK faced the privations of the second world war, its now elderly survivors speak of everyone helping each other out. Perhaps that spirit needs to be rekindled, and who better to do it than Christians whose primary commandments are to love God and to love their neighbour as themselves.

Think, study and talk
Look up some or all of the following passages and put into your own words the principles which they enshrine. Discuss with others, or write down on your own, possible contemporary applications for each one. Then ask how these principles and applications may suggest changes to your current attitudes and actions.

1.  God’s care for vulnerable people: Deuteronomy 10:17-19; Psalm 10:18, 146:9
2.  How to care for vulnerable people: Deuteronomy 24:14-15,17-22; 26:12; Romans 12:13’ 1 Thessalonians 5:14; James 1:27-2:7
3.  Examples of care: 2 Samuel 4:4, 9:1-13; Luke 10:25-37; Acts 4:32-35, 6:1-6
4.  Jesus’ acts of compassion: Matthew 19:13-15; Luke 7:11-15, 8:26-39, 13:10-17, 17:11-17, 18:35-43, 19:1-10
5.  Warnings against exploiting vulnerable people: Exodus 22:22-23; Deuteronomy 27:19; Isaiah 1:23-26, 10:1-4; Amos 2:6-8, 4:1-2, 5:11-15; Matthew 18:5-9, 23:23-24; James 5:1-6

References
1.  A.W. Tozer, We travel an appointed way, OM Publishing, 1992, p.80
2.  http://greenpastures.net/
3.  http://www.trusselltrust.org/foodbank-projects
4.  My colleague Ian Black provides a perspective on this at http://canonianblack.blogspot.co.uk/2013/08/strapped-for-cash.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+blogspot/jleIP+(Ian+Black)   

 © Derek Williams 2013