Mourning a Homeless Man

A few excerpts from a moving post at Today at the Mission:
He died, I'm told, of alcohol poisoning. He was truly homeless - that is, unsheltered - and came to our public meals program. In more than a year, I've never seen him sober. Not once. On one occasion I asked him point blank if he was going to let the booze kill him. He looked me in the eye and said, "Oh yeah, it is going to kill me". This statement was made without emotion except, perhaps, a grim determination. He was a man under sentence of death.

A man came into the Mission to tell us of his passing, so I know he had at least one friend in the world, such as this world is. I'm writing this tonight because I want the universe to know that someone will mourn his passing. I want the universe to know that I know he was loved of God, and that I - to the best that I am able, will honour his life, will honour the image of God that was in him, and will lament that he is gone from our world.
I too mourn his passing today. Will you take this opportunity to remember with me the disenfranchised and homeless in our world.. and say a pray for them and for those of us who have become callous to their plight.

4 comments:

  1. Thanks, Bob. I read that too and was also moved by it.

    ReplyDelete
  2. This brought tears to my eyes as I read it. How callous we have become to the needs of so many. I have to point the 4 fingures back at myself on this one I am sad to say.
    Susan

    ReplyDelete

I love to get comments and usually respond. So come back to see my reply. You can click here to see my comment policy.