James sent the above picture to me this week. Immediately upon viewing it, I was torn between my emotions.
On one hand, the sight is a sad one, a man with nothing, sick and lying alone on a dirty back road of Freetown. All too often, a common scene in Sierra Leone. It is the very reason we wish to establish Lazarus House within the hoped-for compound. A place for the terminally ill to spend their last days under appropriate shelter with people around them who care. No one should die alone. If we can save even one or two from this experience we have done a good thing.
I think of the words of our dear friend Pa Amadu Barrie when he said “the good deeds that you do here on earth are the skin that you where in Paradise”. That is a beautiful thought.
Roo, who will be two years old in October, has for the first time became aware that this ‘isn’t right’ ; that this man is alone and lying on the streets. Roo is greatly disturbed by this sight and immediately wants James to do something. Roo begins to ask many questions, “Why doesn’t he have a place to live?” “Where is his family?” “Can we take him home and feed him?”
The one bit of this story that makes me happy is that Roo, because of the care and love of all of us at Nazareth House – which means YOU – has not realized the tragedy around him before he stumbled onto this man. Because of NHA, Roo at 2 years old, is only now realizing that most people do not have it as good as him. Roo’s parents and sisters know life from a different perspective. They have lived through and experienced with great pain the struggles of life during & after the war, the extreme poverty. James, Kadijah, Lucy & Ann Marie have all gone to bed hungry, they have lived with absolutely nothing, sick overworked, and weak. Nazareth House Apostolate came into their life and changed it and they remember everyday what it was like without NHA. Roo is only now figuring out how fortunate he is…and true to the hearts of his parents, he grieves for those less fortunate than himself. He wants to help change things – through you – through Nazareth House – he can. ….We can and we are …. Please give today!
Nazareth House Apostolate
2216 Goldsmith lane
Louisville, KY 40218