This Sunday at Peace

A Note from Eric Garbison

I was in the Medical Surgical Unit at Saint Luke’s. It's where you go for healing and rehab after surgery. “Amos” was there because of frostbite. He’d survived being homeless for 15 years. Not this year. His right foot and three of his fingers would not survive the winter. 

I asked Amos how he was feeling about this news. After listening for a few minutes my heart sank. He didn’t quite understand what was going to happen. A 35 year old man was living on the streets with mental health and developmental disabilities. Now add to that being wheelchair bound. It was a crushing feeling.

I visited Amos several times after his surgery. On my return after the weekend, I was shocked to hear they had discharged him. They sent him out late in the evening. The nurse was devastated. “I was told he was medically discharged. I had to wheel him out to the bus stop knowing the shelters were closed and it was below zero. I felt horrible. I felt so guilty I gave him all the cash I had in my purse.”

This is not that different from the story of Lazarus and the rich man in Luke 16:19-31. What do we do when the system, like the rich man, is unrepentant? When the system traps us in the corner of injustice? While we fight and resist, organize and mobilize, we also work to “create a new world in the shell of the old?”

Eric