The Face Of A Child

If you want to understand the mystery of creation, just look into the face of a child.

Around the world over Fifty-Thousand children die every day from abandonment, starvation, cruelty, and preventable diseases. In over 80 countries, children are deprived of any education at all.
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Newspapers abound with horror stories of kidnapped, tortured, and exploited children, parental abuse, neglect, rape and abandonment. Throughout the Middle East children have been turned into single–minded, rock–throwing victims and suicide bombers. Truly our children are the fatalities of the 21st Century.
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Television entices young children into modelling themselves as sexual beings and then society cries out when the child becomes a victim of promiscuity. The internet, whilst extolling its benefits, robs them of human interactive and communication skills, denies them the ability to dream, and creates yet another subculture where the family structure has again suffered. Our society encourages and rewards them for creating fantasy alter–egos, under the guise of ‘security.’
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Wherever our western media spreads we turn children into powerful consumers, consuming adults without the maturity to cope with the responsibilities. They strive to emulate the fantasy images of television stars and uninhibitedly mime the most provocative songs and movements.
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What have we done? We have cunningly manufactured the death of innocence and encouraged disenchantment with the innocence of childhood.
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And who is protesting? Sure, when a tragedy occurs, or the newspapers and media choke on the sensationalism and exploitation of yet another tragedy involving a child, what do we do? We forget about it. Yes we do. We do so because we’re too caught up in the next sensational media clip. Their suffering becomes media entertainment designed to sell papers and increase ratings.
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Politicians are quick to jump on the bandwagon when it comes to eradicating the offending event. But how many are capable of repairing the root cause? It’s no different than a single hand trying to hold back an ocean wave. Forget all the scandals we read about. This is the scandal of a millennium and our children’s children will suffer greatly for our complacency.
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One bomb–one single bomb, one political fund-raising event, one lobbyist’s contribution to a political party, or one military aircraft, could provide schools, food, transportation, and medical care for an entire city for ten years in Eastern Europe. But even then the success is so small because as a society we are taught to distrust cultural differences rather than learn about them. We are encouraged to brand cultures as fanatics, nuts, and zealots, rather than build communities of understanding.
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And if I’m heaving salvos all around, I can heave plenty towards ‘religion.’ If one word, one single word comes from a pulpit that glorifies, endorses, promotes, or highlights one culture as superior to another, then we have failed there too.
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So what does religion do? It provides three important things: Community–the chance for people to gather together and share positive values and build the important foundations of a healthy society. Feeding–it provides nourishment in the form of nurturing and encouragement and helps us to learn to deal with the disappointments that bombard us so often. And Celebration–it brings us together to celebrate Christ in our lives, to share in His Body and Blood and to find salvation.
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What will the future say about us? Did we make a difference for our children? Did we envelop them in love? Did we nurture them and demonstrate powerful images of what is right and good?

Right now the answer is: Not yet.

'And Jesus, perceiving the thought of their heart, took a child, and set him by Him. And said unto them, whosoever shall receive this child in My name receiveth me; and whosoever shall receive Me receiveth him that sent me: for he that is least among you all, the same shall be great.' Luke 9:47.48

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