Today I’m planning a raid on my own intransigent desires and preoccupations, and perhaps, for a day, get me set round right.
I’ve avoided the pictures coming out of Haiti because it assaults, like nothing else, my sense of control, my orientation toward self-absorption and, by comparison, my pettiness. I don’t like the sudden (Haitian) distraction from what I have planned for the weekend. I don’t like it that my little daily routines that provide me security–are not merely relativized, but made hollow by human grief and suffering.
But a catastrophe of this scale also assaults my faith. And here, I’m not always sure I know what to do. Right now I find myself recoiling from even the well-meaning prayers that ask God to comfort the 100,000 families in the midst of their cataclysmic suffering.
Today I’ve looked more closely. Looked at the pictures. Saw eyes and faces and hands and feet. Saw not so much the tangled wreckage–saw people.
Today I do one small thing. I go without pay, for today. Not my idea, I got it here.
Where to donate? World Relief Canada does very good work and I have personal knowledge of their reputability.
But of course there are many places to donate. Here’s a list from Care2.
Thank you for your thoughts and information from Care2. I don’t know if you have heard of the Cine Institute in Haiti. If not, please visit Cineinstitute.com to see how young Haitian filmmakers are rising above and doing what they know how to do. They’ve dug their cameras out the wreckage and are posting great videos and photos. We send our love to our brothers and sisters.
Thank you so much for the link Ellen. Glimmers of hope.