We fly too high

I recently read Unlocking Horns by David Niyonzima – a brief and personal introduction to forgiveness and reconciliation in Burundi. I was struck by the quoted poem by Wingert – a Christian relief worker in Burundi in the 60s, which uses the story of the good Samaritan to challenge us to not look away from the suffering of people in the developing world…

Two donkey hours away
From Zion city lay
A beaten man.
Levite and Priest espied
And heard the man who cried,
But passed him by.
A few jet hours away
From San Francisco lay
More sore-beat men.
We fly too high to hear
The cry and see the tear-
We eat our lunch.

I think if we’re honest, we make a lot of excuses for not acting when we see suffering in places like Burundi. We tell ourselves that that is just “how it is”, that’s what “Africans” are used to, the problems are “too big”, that “we’ve got enough of our owns problems to worry about.” We look away and eat our lunch.