Poverty Is Hazardous to Your Health

Hmmm.  How old are these tires?

This month, a good friend now living in Arizona returned to the area with his son for vacation.  He stayed over his dad's house and hoped to check out a few museums on Cape Cod during the week.  I was invited to tag along but the trip had me worried.  My friend's father struggled financially and I wondered if his car was being properly maintained.  No one else shared my concern and later that night, my mother told me to be positive.

Our long journey to "the Cape" started smoothly but as we passed through Boston, the car made a grinding noise.  I quickly realized it was a flat tire and told my friend to pull into the breakdown lane.  With no usable spare, we were stranded.  Luckily, a state trooper passed by and offered us assistance.  The car was eventually towed a repair shop near my friend's dad's house but since the driver only had room for one passenger, my friend's son, dad and I had to take the commuter rail back.  We missed catching the noon train by three minutes.  "Be positive," my mother said.  It seems odd to say the highlight of our trip to Cape Cod was not dying in an automobile accident.

The "scenic view" from our Cape Cod trip. 

The repair shop said all of the car's tires were way too old so my friend spent over 500 dollars to buy four new ones.  It turned out his dad was deferring maintenance on his automobile and the additional discovery of rusting tie rods meant a second attempt to Cape Cod was out of the question.  Throughout this whole ordeal, I thought about how dangerous poverty could be.  We've all seen junky old cars that are patched together but have we ever thought about the people who drive them?

My friend's dad had been a loyal employee of the Jordan Marsh department stores since 1969.  The company was bought by Macy's in 1996 and then ten years later, they merged with the Filene's department store chain.  Since Filene's employees were unionized and the Macy's employees were not, my friend's dad suddenly found himself out of a job.  To add insult to injury, he was only a few years away from retirement.

Poverty in the suburbs can be difficult to see but every now and then I would catch glimpses of his financial hardships.  In winter, he shut off the heat and wore extra layers of clothes.  On hot summer days, he wouldn't run the air conditioner.  At night, he used a flashlight to go from room to room instead of turning on the lights.  One year, he lost a shocking amount of weight because there was little money for groceries.

Recently, a local TV show examined the health risks associated with poverty by comparing two Boston neighborhoods that were only a few miles apart.  In the affluent Bay Back, the average life expectancy was 90 but in the much poorer Roxbury, the average life expectancy was 58.  Why the disparity?  Those interviewed cited a number of reasons including limited access to health care, food deserts, crime, stress and even depression.  When you're struggling to make ends meet, problems seem compounded. 

It's tempting for some Christians to say, "God helps those who help themselves" and "Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day.  Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime" but those sayings aren't found anywhere in the Bible.  If you look at the story of the Good Samaritan, we are called to go that extra mile for those in need.  Nowhere does the Good Samaritan tell the man who was robbed and beaten, "Pull yourself up by your bootstraps."  There are times when people feel like the world has beaten them down and they need help to get back up again. 

When my friend's dad lost his job, it left him a broken man.  He had done everything right but still wound up on the losing side of capitalism.  It would have been great had he just brushed himself off and found another job to cover all of his expenses but for people who are poor in spirit, it doesn't always work that way.  Sometimes even when they know the proverbial runaway train is coming, they can't muster enough strength to get out of the way.

During the latest presidential election, there was plenty of rhetoric concerning jobs, downsizing, poverty, living wages and retirement.  Sometimes I think this country has too much of an "us versus them" mentality with the successful not fully understanding the hardships of their more unfortunate brothers and sisters in Christ.  I'm not talking about creating a welfare state or an entitlement mentality but seeing my friend's dad struggle with so many problems during his golden years makes me think we aren't doing enough to lend a helping hand to those who need it the most.