Family First

If you watched the Dateline special on poverty in SE Ohio, you would have met a woman named Sunny.  First of all, I think it would be a lot of pressure to be named after a disposition.  For this woman, her outlook on life and the finer things, like self actualization that could produce that "sunny disposition," take a back burner to other issues.  Like food.  And shelter. 

Sunny, during most of the 9 months Ann Curry followed the community, lived in a house with 14 other people.  She moved in with her husband and children to her parents home because her father become ill.  She quit her job to do this.

Honestly, my first thoughts upon watching this included words like "irresponsible" and "crazy."  Now, I love my parents dearly (Hi Mom and Dad!) but I don't think they would even approve of me quitting a job to move in and care for them.  I think we would try to work something out, leaning on a wider network of friends, family, neighbors, church, etc to care for the sick person.

That's how I was raised.  Now, we're not a "live to work" family, where we value work above family or self.  I would even say we are the opposite, where we align with the "work to live" mindset, working only to make sure we can pay for things, to sustain the family responsibly, to plan for the future.

What happens, though, if I hadn't grown up in my particular family?  What happens if I was never taught to save, to plan for the future, to make "smart" decisions in light of my economic and social situation?  What happens if my culture values family, and the care of elders, above anything else?

I've seen it happen before on mission trips to Appalachia.  There was a group of families living in what I can only describe as a "holler,"  surrounded by shells of rusted out cars and crowded with chickens, beagles, and numerous family members.  Two of the men in the family were out of work, and couldn't keep a job when they got one, because they consistently put their family first.  When their mother was sick, they took care of her and working took a back seat.

I'm not making excuses for people, there are many decisions and turns to take in life.  But I do think it is very, very important for people who would lay judgment on those who act (in their eyes) irresponsibly to consider differing cultures and varied orders of priorities in the people they may see on television. 

People get in tough situations, but instead of judging and griping, we need to continue work to build sustainable lifestyles and communities, educating on self-sufficiency.  If we turn our backs and shun people who are different, people who we think are "less" because they act differently than we expect them to, the problem of poverty can not and will not just go away.  As Zach preaches, we have to be proactive (in building lives), not reactive (to individual situations.)