Sanitised

Life is sanitized.  We clean and clean again.  We dispose of anything unsightly, smelly, or out of the norms.  We talk of clean, pure, and germ-free our rooms, homes, and hands.  Life is about eliminating the bad stuff, purging anything which might cause harm, and ignoring what we cannot see.  Life is to be life in safety.  Waking moments should be ones of peace.  Steps should never lands in things soft.
 
I don’t recognize the goal.  Life is messy.  There are many things we may not find pleasant, but it is what it is.  Either we deal with it and get on with life or things only get worse.  Eliminating or ignoring are just two of a much wider range of answers!  Sometimes one must take a long hard look at what is difficult; otherwise the search for answers will never begin.  One thinks of Darfur, Bosnia, and Rawanda and realizes we have looked, at best briefly.
 
There is a danger if we do not see and then take the steps to open up our communities of safety, refuge, and nurture.  First, we will have said through our actions that some human life isn’t worth as much as ours.  Second, the painful, harsh, and brutal reality is that in this world today it can be “tough luck to stragglers—they'll be killed on the spot, throats cut, bellies ripped open, babies smashed on the rocks while mothers and fathers watch, houses looted, wives raped.” (Isaiah 13.15, 16)  This isn’t fiction – it is the world in which we live.
 
Yet there is an alternative.  With each dawn we can open the windows of our soul to what is.  We can see with eyes open wide.  We can listen with hearts ready to hear.  We can touch the untouchable.  It is in these actions that we see life in our community for what it really is – it is in these moments we can infuse compassion, mercy, and love where it is most needed.  It may messy and dirty, yet it is God’s gift to you and me.