Tag Archives: Child abuse and neglect

Advocacy

Eastertide
May 18, 2018

Scripture Reading: Romans 8:22-27

Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but that very Spirit intercedes with sighs too deep for words. And God, who searches the heart, knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God. –Romans 8:26-27

This is one of my favorite scriptures because it assures me that even in my weakest moments I can depend on my Advocate to translate the mishmash of my mind into something meaningful and right.

We talk a lot of modeling our lives in the ways of Jesus, but I do not hear much about following the patterns of the Holy Spirit, which is also an example of how we are to live.

There is a program now that does just that for abused and neglected children following the role model of the Advocate. Court Appointed Special Advocates or CASA for short are assigned the responsibility of being an advocate for the child involved. Children get lost in all the challenges of court intervention. Even if their parents are abusive or neglectful in the eyes of others they are still the child’s parents and have been their primary source of learning about life. I remember a child in foster care whose mother suffered from severe hallucinations. She had the children dodging unseen airplanes bombing them inside their house.  The foster child told me until he was in foster care he thought that was the way all mothers were, that was his normal. We did not have CASA volunteers when I worked in child welfare, but they serve such an important role in redeeming the lives of children while protecting the fragile relationship of parenting as much as possible.

There are many places for advocates to make a difference in the lives of not only children but the elderly, persons with disabilities, the homeless. Look around and see where your talents and skills might be used as an Advocate.

Prayer: Thank you God for the gift of the Holy Spirit and thank you for all those who willing heed your call to advocate for others. Amen.

All scriptures are quoted from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicized Edition, copyright 1989, 1995, Division of Christian Education of the National Council of Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights are reserved.

Life

Epiphany
February 7, 2017

Scripture Reading: Deuteronomy 30:15-20

I call heaven and earth to witness against you today that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Choose life so that you and your descendants may live, loving the Lord your God, obeying him, and holding fast to him; for that means life to you and length of days, so that you may live in the land that the Lord swore to give to your ancestors, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob. –Deuteronomy 30:19-20

“What is life?” is a complicated question in our world today. The word “life” used in the scripture above is defined from the Hebrew in Strong’s Concordance as consisting of earthly felicity combined (often) with spiritual blessedness*. Life as earthly happiness combined with spiritual blessedness probably would not be in most of our definitions. We likely would get clinical describing life as the presence of breathing or not. The breath of life is Biblical too**. When discussing end of life issues, we often talk about quality of life, which might get closure to felicity. Deuteronomy may be saying that earthly happiness is contingent on spiritual happiness. I call that being in sync with God. I think this scripture implies an eternal status with an earthly interlude.

All life is God’s. All life is sacred. All life is eternal. We are called to be respecters of life; we do not control it. My experience working as a social worker in a children’s hospital reshaped my thinking on life refocusing my purpose. Because the hospital was a trauma center, it was the last, best hope for critical situations. In one year, I worked with eight such situations involving children who died from child abuse or neglect. I did not keep count of the hundreds of abused or neglected children who cross our thresholds who were saved. Several of these were left to live out their lives with permanent disabilities. Prevention of child abuse and neglect become the focus of my life. While restoration is an imperative, total avoidance of the damage from child abuse or neglect is a far more credible course.

I never questioned that each of those children who died rest in spiritual blessedness in God’s arms for eternity. I have always questioned why we live in a society that cannot provide for the felicity of God’s children during their earthly interlude. Ending poverty, providing training for parents, the availability of quality physical and mental health care, and assuring quality education at all levels would be a great place to start.

Prayer: Jesus, you said let the little children come unto me***, help us to understand that loving little children is a quest for all of us. Amen.

*http://biblehub.com/hebrew/2416.htm
**For example, see Genesis 2:7
*** See at Matthew 19:14

All scriptures are quoted from the new Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicized Edition, copyright 1989, 1995, Division of Christian Education of the National Council of Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights are reserved.