I had a really interesting conversation this week that I thought you might find interesting and shocking at the same time.
There is a woman who has worked at Project Canaan for many years and now she is considered to be very old (I won’t tell you her age for fear of confusion or offense). She is a Grandmother so I will call her Gogo and she recently retired after working with us for ten years. We continue to support her with dried food and medical care, but her daughter stepped into the job that she once filled and Gogo is at home caring for the many grandchildren who live at her homestead.
A couple of weeks ago it was reported to me that Gogo had been beaten by one of her granddaughters and was suffering with bruises and pain. Upon further investigation the story wasn’t quite as straight forward as that (it never is), but the bottom line was that the 21-year-old granddaughter had an attitude, was getting into trouble and couldn’t hold down a job. Jobs are very hard to find here, but both the Gogo and her daughter are both incredibly hard-working women and a wonderful example to the next generation, so I assumed that the granddaughter would be a great hire. Apparently not.
When I pursued the questioning further and asked why the granddaughter was not a good worker when her mother and Gogo are tireless and faithful workers, the answer was that the granddaughter had “been given everything in life and never had to work for it”.
This family is one of the poorest families that I have ever met in my life. They never have enough food, they never have enough money to send everyone to school, there are always holes in their clothes and leaks in the roof, but to them, this girl had been given everything. My head was spinning.
That is a concept we are all familiar with and it’s called entitlement. We probably witness it every day in affluent areas, malls and families all around us, but I have always thought of it as being a rich people problem. I have been pondering this all week and have spent more time on this blog than I usually do, trying to figure out what I really want to say.
I am going to go out on a limb and say that her behavior was not about entitlement, but rather poor mental health due to living in a world of hopelessness (i.e. never having enough food, never having enough money to send everyone to school, always holes in their clothes and leaks in the roof). Yes, her mother and Gogo have worked themselves to the bone every day to provide for too many children left in the wake of poverty and disease caused by poverty and that is all she sees for her future. Why comply? Why not lash out?
There was an excellent blog posted by our Khutsala team this past week that starts by saying, “A lesser-known consequence of unemployment in Eswatini is poor mental health, especially among the youth.” It goes on to refer to a study “Exploring the relationship between unemployment and mental illness among the youth in selected communities of Eswatini” which got me thinking about the young girl in the story above.
During the month of March Heart for Africa focuses on the “P” in our HOPE acronym, which stands for “Poverty”. The longer I live in Africa and the more I learn about how culture, economics, disease and pandemics all twist together do NOT live in harmony, the more I see that poverty is not just about unemployment and lack of money. Habitat for Humanity wrote an article discussing the different types of poverty. In it they say “There are two main classifications of poverty – absolute vs relative poverty. Both of these two types of poverty are focused on income and consumption. However, sometimes poverty is not only to do with economics, but it is also connected with society and politics.”
Project Canaan is a city on a hill and we are here to shine light in darkness, bring hope to the hopeless and bless the poor in spirit through our words and our actions.
Matthew 5:13-16 says, “You are the light of the world. A town built on a hill cannot be hidden. Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven.”
The Message bible translation says this, ““Here’s another way to put it: You’re here to be light, bringing out the God-colors in the world. God is not a secret to be kept. We’re going public with this, as public as a city on a hill. If I make you light-bearers, you don’t think I’m going to hide you under a bucket, do you? I’m putting you on a light stand. Now that I’ve put you there on a hilltop, on a light stand—shine! Keep open house; be generous with your lives. By opening up to others, you’ll prompt people to open up with God, this generous Father in heaven.”
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