Day 35: Lofty Ideals?

My brain is swimming these days when I think about doing good.  What does that mean?  How do I do good in the most humane and loving way?  I tell you, this thought, at least lately, has been on my mind nearly all the time.  When I'm at the grocery store and wanting to make healthy choices for my family, the earth, and my "neighbor"...organic or local?  When I'm throwing trash away, and wondering why does everything have to be shrink-wrapped and boxed up, creating so much waste...and should I throw it in the trash, or put it in the recycle bin?  When I'm reading a book on how my life could and should make a positive impact in the world...should I be donating money, or visiting a third-world country, or become a political activist?

I surely don't have any answers at this time.  I wish I did.  The truth is, I am feeling more confused the more that I read and learn.  It's not simple.  There isn't one answer that solves all of the worlds problems.  Richard Stearns says in his book The Hole in our Gospel, "But poverty is extremely complex.  Picture the poor caught in a spider-web of interwoven causes that trap them hopelessly while the marauding spiders of hunger, war, disease, ignorance, injustice, natural disasters, and exploitation prey upon them unrestrained.  While there are solutions to poverty - ways to free them from the web - there are no simple solutions."  And I would say that this statement could probably be applied to a lot of other problems besides just poverty.  There are no simple solutions for climate change.  Or defeating disease.  Or overcoming ingrained cultural and racial conflict.

So I guess at this point I will ask for grace.  I will keep asking the questions, and learning in order to make better choices.  And hope that as I continue on this journey called life, I will eventually be able to find a way to minimize my footprint on the earth, that as a family we could figure out a way to reduce our part in contributing to the systems that perpetuate poverty, and that this legacy could be passed on to generations to come.  Lofty ideals, perhaps.  But good news if we can indeed succeed.    

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