Facebook failed me today.
Instead of the usual mindless jumble of baby pictures, flashback
Thursdays, and I’m-eating-at-a-better-restaurant-than-you check-ins, I got post
after post of conflicting opinions about Baltimore. People love the mother who took down her
son. People hate the mayor. Some people feel the riots are
justified. Some people are just finding
justification for their beliefs.
One of
my students was working on her exam after everyone else finished and left, and
she started talking through her ideas with me.
“Is there any way to prevent riots?”
she mulled. “How can we stop them?” “Are we doing the right thing or is there a
better way?” I tossed out some of the
rhetoric lighting up my Facebook feed, but I started to think. Is there a better way? What are we missing?
This I
know: the National Guard can shut down a riot, but it can’t truly prevent
it. Laws are meaningless in the face of
blind rage. (Or in the case of several
sports-crazy campuses, drunken celebration.)
Public policy might help, but history shows us that it can only do so
much. If we really want to end riots, we
have to change hearts. And that can only
happen one relationship at a time.
Yes,
the people burning buildings and breaking windows are taking advantage of a
situation, but most people with stable, safe upbringings would not even think
of going on a looting spree. The young
people we see on TV have most likely grown up in poverty, they most likely come
from broken families, and they most likely went to community schools where
everyone lived just like them. Should
their fathers have taught them right from wrong? Yes.
But your opinion is not going to get their dad off drugs, off the
street, or out of prison to do it.
Should their mothers be supervising their homework every night? Yes.
But public opinion doesn’t mean anything if mom is mentally ill, or
working two jobs to keep food in the fridge.
Should the schools teach them lifeskills to help them be
successful? Yes. But sometimes those lessons are drowned out
by the messiness of their lives. Other
people should step up, but they aren’t.
So how do we change hearts? Who
is going to make a difference?
You.
Volunteer
at a Boys and Girls Club. Become a Big
Brother or a Big Sister. Tutor. Coach.
Volunteer at a community center.
Teach job skills. Teach GED
classes. Do paperwork for a nonprofit
that does all these things so that other volunteers have more time to build
relationships. If you’re like me and in
a season of life where volunteering means spending money you don’t have for a
babysitter, ask how you can help from home.
Or financially support the people working on the front lines. You don’t have to hop out of your car on the
scariest street corner in town to make a difference. There are organizations that will show you
the ropes; they’ll ease in in; they’ll train you. They want you. They need you.
It will
be messy. Redemption is messy work. Crossing cultural boundaries is hard. Most kids lash out when someone really loves
them, because sometimes love has to be tough.
Sometimes it will seem like you aren’t making a difference at all.
As long
as we pretend that the fatherless, the orphans, the angry teenagers, and the
least of these are someone else’s responsibility, we’ll have more riots. We’ll have more anger. Nothing will change. But if we get our shoes muddy, if we offer a
hand up, if we open our hearts, we might just see our cities change for the
better.
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