Our world is facing seemingly insurmountable problems from wars, rumours of them, strife, disaster, poverty and disease. It is not bad enough that we have cancer, now we have to grapple with the plague of Ebola. In an age where there’s much to despair about, we can be that hope through our loving.
The sum effect of all of these is that there is an immense need for loving kindness and tender mercy all over the world. Unfortunately we are blinded to this need by the numerous distractions we are surrounded with. I won’t go into all of them because we know what they are. However there is one that is most potent – self-pity. It is very crippling and must be overcome before we are able to reach out and love our neighbour. When we shift the focus from us to our neighbour, our world and our Creator, something radical changes within us.