Ronal

He's the reason I was a bit discouraged in my last post.  Ronal has hydrocephaly and also had meningitis as a baby.  Since they don't know how to treat it here, he was left with serious mental disabilities and doesn't have use of his legs or one of his arms.  But what's worse is that another reason (perhaps the main reason) that Ronal cannot walk or control his bladder or behave well or speak well is that his parents do not help him.  His father hates him.  He treats him like an animal.  His mother cares, but, with working all day at the market, is still incredibly negligent.  Since coming to the Huaycan project in December, Ronal has learned to color in the lines, do puzzles on his own, not to hit, to say "si, hermana" when I ask him to do something, and is working on telling us when he needs to go to the bathroom. 

I was thinking of him when I was disgusted with myself and the Church concerning how we treat the helpless and poor.  I'm not telling you about Ronal to try to manipulate you into feeling bad enough to send money, or to even throw up a prayer for him.  You don't even have to remember Ronal after you read this.  The point is that Ronal is just one case.  Here in Peru, in Lima, in Huaycan, at our church.  And without us, no one would cherish his life, provide for him, teach him or delight in him.  Terry Schiavo is just like Ronal.  Only no one - except me, and now you - will know about him, or even care.  But we're supposed to.  I wonder where the Ronals are in Norman.  Is it Mrs. Churchill, the woman RUF helped last semester?  Or is it a young boy who isn't being fed?  Or a single mother who is alone and vulnerable?  Or is it the visitor in the back row of Christ the King?  It's weird to think that I'm called to share in so intimate a way my time, gifts, resources and love - with strangers and with people so uncomfortably different than me.