One day when we were riding the bus down from the mountains back to Castries I saw a young girl, perhaps 18 at the oldest, walking the streets. She was a very pretty girl, with long silky black hair, and beautiful eyes, however, her clothes were typical ghetto clothes. Not really ratty, but skimpy kinda like a designer copy. She had a young baby on her hip, when we caught each other’s eyes, even for those few seconds, what I saw in her eyes tore my heart. I have never seen so much despair; she looked like she didn’t hope anymore. When we passed her I wished with all my heart that I could have got off the bus and talked to her. I don’t know why she looked that way, that might not have been what she felt like, but somehow when I saw her, I knew that’s how she felt. Days after she still haunted me, I wonder what I would have done, could I have talked to her, I’m a shy person; I don’t like talking to people. Would I have had the courage to stop her? Would I have been able to help? I would like to say I said a prayer for her, but I didn’t think about that till much later.
The poor here are different than the poor that we found in Mexico, they don’t just need food, clothes, houses, they do sometimes need that, but their needs are something much deeper. It’s spiritual. Its like that girl, she probably has a house, a boyfriend, some sort of a job, but she still had that hopeless look. Why? It’s a deep longing that they, as we all do, try to fill with what the world offers. Drugs, sex, money, power. But let’s face it; those don’t fill that hole, that longing. Only God can. Now that might sound easy, well then we just tell them about God and bang! Everything is better. Unfortunately the real world isn’t that easy, because we are a fallen humanity. What would you do if something like this happened to you? Would you be able to stop and help? Would you be able to pray for the person? I hope that God will be able to send me people like this to help.
