A friend of mine, who ended his Marriage some time ago, told me that «Divorce is a passport to poverty».
Ginny (not her true name) is divorced. I have known her for many years but I don’t know a lot about her life. However I know that she is divorced, jobless, has three children, and is very poor… on the border line of misery. Ginny has survived for many years under the care of “People Helping People”. In spite of her university studies she has failed in every job she has tried.
Her son has suffered from asthma since childhood; then drugs have been part of his young life. Finally he quit drugs and is taking medicine to help him in the recovery process. But another bad thing happened that is not common. At twenty one years old, he recently, had a heart attack.
The main point of the story is that Ginny is very poor and every day is a new day full of fear and surprises. A few weeks ago she got a bag of food from the Association People Helping People. One of her neighbours approached her asking if she had anything that she could share because her family had nothing to eat. A little while later, another neighbour did the same. Even knowing that Ginny was poor, she came to her with the same request: she had nothing for dinner and asked if she could help her with something.
Ginny did something that made me think. In the bag that she had received from People Helping People she found a big potato. Ginny took the potato, and cut it into three pieces. She kept one piece for her family and shared the other two pieces with her neighbours.
With something that they could still find, three families had dinner: with one potato, and lots of love transformed into service.
«Small things done by small people in small places change the world». (Mother Teresa).
Fr. Bernardino Andrade August 23, 2020