I am Nobody...

"Jesus loves the little children...
All the children of the world..."


"The biggest disease today is not leprosy or tuberculosis, but rather, the feeling of being unwanted."  Mother Teresa, from the book she authored: "Where There is Love, There is God: A Path to Closer Union with God and Greater Love" p. 82

Chapter 2 of the book, "No Longer a Slumdog" opens with this quote from Mother Teresa.  The author explains the history and origins of the caste system in India, dating back to over 1,500 years before Christ.  A cruel and dehumanizing system devised to protect the imagined superiority of the newly arrived Aryans in India over the indigenous peoples, this system allowed the Aryan minority to enrich themselves at the expense of the native peoples of India.  Thousands of years later, even though this system is officially outlawed by the government, the caste system still rules the minds and actual practices of the people of India.

To us as Americans, although we do experience some "class warfare" in our own nation, it is difficult to wrap our minds around a system as dehumanizing and brutal as the caste system in India.  K.P. Yohannan's book introduces the reader to a world of unimaginable deprivation and cruelty that leads to the rampant abuse and murder of men, women and children, based simply on the caste into which they were born.

In this system, caste is determined at birth and, as such, for those millions who live under the teachings of the caste system, there will never be any opportunity to rise above the caste an innocent child is assigned at birth.  The child born into the caste system, especially the lowest caste of all, the Dalits, or "Untouchables" is "cast off" at birth as sub-human, unworthy of the most basic human necessities - a simple home, food, clean drinking water, an opportunity to grow up and make a living, or live with any sense of human dignity.

As a Dalit, you are worthy of nothing but contempt.  You live in filth and are considered deserving of nothing more.  Literally, no one in the castes above you is allowed to even touch you, hence the name "Untouchables".  You will live and die in the slum you were born in.  Those who are above you consider you to be on the same level as a wild animal that ekes out a living eating from garbage cans and rolling in the mud.  You are nothing more than a "slumdog".

As a child of the Untouchables, you have no value beyond what others decide to do to you.  You will likely starve to death before you reach maturity, or you will be sold into child labor camps or child prostitution, where you may be tortured and murdered at the pleasure of your owner, often by the age of five.  Your parents may sell you because they have no hope of even feeding you when they cannot feed themselves.  If you are stolen or murdered, no one will report it, because no one cares.  You are nothing. 

This book is a shocking and eye-opening expose of the caste system in India, and the devastating effects it brings upon the familys of the Dalits, particularly the children.  It is tempting to put this book down and refuse to look at the horrors it describes.  But, these are children who are precious beyond measure to the Lord of the Universe, who suffered and died that they might be redeemed.  As followers of Jesus Christ, we have a vested interest in these children, simply because He cares for them.

All throughout this startling and compelling book. the author challenges us to remember the words of Christ, the passion and compassion He always showed us for the little children that flocked to Him on the hillsides and roads of Israel.  He never turned them away, but always challenged His disciples to make room for the children - to care for them, for they are precious to our God.  On p. 72, Yohannan draws the reader to remember the words of Jesus in Matthew 18:10 (NASB) "See that you do not despise one of these little ones, for I say to you that their angels in heaven continually see the face of My Father who is in heaven".  We cannont turn away from the cries and anguish of these little ones without turning away from Christ, Himself...

I would like to close this post with a poem included in this book
(p. 45) written by the author from the perspective of one of the Dalit children.  It is heartbreaking...

I am nobody

Worthless my life is

To Untouchables I was born.

A Dalit child my fate sealed.

 

I was born in slums

Rights?  We have none

To upper-caste our lives we owe

Slaves to serve all their wish.

 

Poverty and hunger

Is all I ever knew

If there is hope

Tell me how?

 

What is my future?

Do I have any?

It all looks so dark

And I wish I was not born.

 

*Poem "I am Nobody" published by permission of gfa books, a division of Gospel for Asia. If you would like to receive a free copy of the book, "No Longer a Slumdog" by K.P. Yohannan, please send your request to: www.gfa.org/sharehope You may also like to consider sponsoring one of these children monthly through the Bridge of Hope. Contact www.gfa.org/slumdog to be a blessing to a child in desperate need.




The Least of These...

"Sometime in your life, I hope that you might see one starved man, the look on his face when the bread finally arrives.  Hope that you might have baked it or bought it or even kneaded it yourself.  For that look on his face, for your meeting his eyes across a piece of bread, you might be willing to lose a lot, or suffer a lot, or die a little, even." Daniel Berrigan Author of the book: "Communion" 

The priceless little gem of a book, "No Longer a Slumdog", written by K.P. Yohannan, opens with this  quote from Berrigan.  As I read this opening challenge, so many images flashed before the theater of my mind.  

I see a little girl, surrounded by her brothers and sisters, eating a dinner of mayonnaise spread over thin pieces of white bread.  Never, ever enough to satisfy the hunger of a growing child...

I see the face of a young mother, crying over her children at bedtime, and then again in the morning, knowing there is no more food to put on the table than there was yesterday.

I see a little girl so thankful for the carton of milk "someone" provided for her at school that morning - the only breakfast she would have.

I see the face of poverty, hunger and desperation stalking a mother and father who could not find a way to feed their starving children.

I see a box overflowing with turkey and all of the trimmings, placed at the front door by someone who was somehow moved enough to dig into his surplus to make a difference for a needy family that Christmas.   My child's eyes were enormous with wonder that day.  That anyone really cared...

I do not know who placed it there.  I only know I should have burst to see the evidence of love from a stranger.  I have never forgotten the tender mercy of that person whose name I never knew.  

When I read about small children, starving and in desperate need, I feel the pain of their hunger.  I see their sunken eyes.  I hear their cries.  I see their mother's tears.  And so does our God.  It is for these that He suffered and died and became the Bread of Life.  He has promised to satisfy our every need.  

As I read this book, describing the pain and tragedy of the lives of these poor families in India, I am reminded that WE are the hands and feet and heart of the Living God.  If we shut down our hearts, we shut off the streams of Living Water and Hope that He has promised to "the least of these".

The love of Christ compels us to care and to care deeply.  Over the next few weeks, I will be sharing a few notes from this compelling book, which is all about "bringing Hope to children in crisis."  That is the least I can do for the cause of Christ, on behalf of the children He loves who are suffering unimaginable agonies.  We have no excuse any more to not see.  The world has become so small.  Thank God these children are no longer invisible.  The question is - now what do we do about it?  

Like the person who dropped off the box on our front door, leaving a message of love and hope behind that I have never forgotten, may we be roused from our complacency enough to make a difference, for at least one child.  Whatever you do, "I hope that you might see one starved man (woman or child), and the look on their face when the bread finally arrives..."  In the Name of Jesus.  In the Name of Jesus.  In the precious, all giving Name of Jesus, the Bread of Life...