Social Conscience And Charity For The Homeless

By Author: Jeff Rogers
Total Articles: 1
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On a planet that is as incredibly rich as this Earth, it goes without saying that each and every one of our human contemporaries should be secure regarding the basic needs of living. An objective observer from another planet would quickly calculate the resources and the population and come to the conclusion that something is very wrong with the way this planet is being managed. Most of us would undoubtedly agree. Two thirds of the population of this globe languish in poverty under the real and growing threat that these basic needs will go unmet.

There are most certainly problems with the governance of resources, and we have to acknowledge this fact. We don't mean to ignore the accomplishment that government grants to society, but we must admit that mismanagement, graft, corruption, and special interest all feed into this problem. In the third world these factors are more severe as far as the impact they have on the availability of basic needs, but even in developed countries the structure of commercial and political systems bear responsibility for the inequity that grows day by day among our friends and neighbors.

Apart ...
... from the responsibility that the system at large bears in the matter of material human suffering, it must be stressed that the individual is largely the charge of him or herself. We are responsible to use the resources and our intellect and to care for the matters of our own lives without becoming an undue burden on others in society. Even a compassionate heart must admit that there are many activities that people should engage in that they don't and many that should not be personally enacted that yet are. Some of these activities are voluntary and some are not. The same may be said of debilitating conditions that individuals live with. Some are self inflicted or self imposed and can be overcome by personal spirit. Clearly though, some cannot. It is a difficult matrix within which to judge.

We cannot then, blame commerce and government entirely for the shrinking middle class and completely exonerate the individual regarding thier own responsibilities. On the other hand, we can not reasonable account for the growing poor only by blaming them. There is most certianly systemic failures as play. As personal economic problems grow systemically however, it becomes corrospondingly more critical that we take more care individually concerning our own economic posture.

It is not the purpose of The seattlecharitynetwork.com to attempt to re-engineer the politico-economic structure of the world. Also, we cannot interfere in the lives and hearts of those who do not welcome our attention. What we can do is to facilitate benevolent community action, education, philanthropy, encouragement, and kindness.

At the outset we should make our position clear regarding Government and Religion. There have been many efforts both by government and by religion to administrate social benevolence. We do not desire to affiliate our effort with any of these. We wish this program to be community based and to bring to bear the limitless enthusiasm of the local and regional business community. The small and mid-sized businesses all around us still represent to a large degree the heart of our society. Obviously, the everyday individuals among us who are busy just living out our lives are representative of an even larger part. Big Business, big Government and big Religion don't seem to relate much to the heart of our communities any more, if they ever really did, and poverty is very much a problem of communities.

Large organizational systems admittedly have difficulty focusing on the individual and his or her issues and needs. But even if they could, the only attention that will really help people is the one on one kind that we can provide on an inter community basis. It has to be me helping you and you helping me. A huge organization dumping money at the problem may help in some impersonal ways, and some personal care might trickle into that scenario randomly, or in some fashion, but community level one on one is clearly the first and best hope for most people suffering homelessness.

We sincerely hope that you enjoy the programs that are running on seattlecharitynetwork.com. We hope that you will engage them and benefit from them and that others will benefit from your attention as well.