I have nobody to help me

John 5: 7

Homelessness in London is not difficult to find. Nor is it difficult in my experience to think quite cynical thoughts about the beggars we encounter, and to find reasons to ignore them. If they really are destitute, how is it that some of them look quite well fed? Do they really want to be helped? Won’t the pocket change I give them just go on beer and cigarettes? How should I help them? These questions – and our whole attitude towards giving – come into sharper focus and take on a greater urgency during Lent

Some years ago, because of my work as a journalist, I moved to Morocco with my family. It’s a fabulous holiday destination, and a fascinating country. But there is an awful lot of poverty that many tourists don’t see. So many beggars and invalids, with very little support from the state, if any. One Sunday morning -- our Sabbath – I went to the bakery with my youngest son Dominick to pick up some breakfast. As we left, there was a beggar sitting on the ground asking for help. Dominick asked me on the way home why I hadn’t given the beggar any money. I told him that I had didn’t have any money, having spent it all at the bakery, which was quite possibly a lie, and that I would have had to go to the bank to get some. But instead of accepting that for an answer, he just said, “Well then, go to the bank and get all your money and give it to him.” That may not have been exactly what he said. But I distinctly remember him saying that I should get all my money and give it to the beggar!

Dominick’s words really struck me, because it was such a crazy suggestion, which came from a five-year-old child and actually made me feel quite guilty. I failed to go to the bank, nevermind give away all my money, although I hope I was a bit more generous on subsequent trips to the bakery. Jesus makes similarly radical suggestions in the Gospels – to sell everything we own and give the money to the poor -- and of course he has a special empathy with children, who see the world in a different way to us grown-ups. Their hearts are not hardened by experience and cold, rational calculation. How can I possibly give all my money to the poor? And in any case, what would it achieve? Maybe I could help 10 beggars, but there will always be countless more.

But thinking like that seems to miss the point of what Jesus is saying. We can always do more. Even if we don’t have any money, that doesn’t stop us from performing spontaneous acts of kindness. Jesus teaches us to reach out to those in need, to go beyond what seems possible, to give and not to count the cost, in the words of St Ignatius. It is an extraordinary message that defies human logic.

A reflection written by Simon Martelli, a parishioner of St Augustine's Hammersmith, London

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