CHILDREN FIRST HOW ARE YA!!!!!!!

CHILDREN FIRST HOW ARE YA!!!!

My heart is broken and it goes out to the parents and families of the children who featured in tonight's RTE Prime Time Investigates Programme and also in the latest figures that have recently come out about child poverty and homelessness in our country. My heart also goes out to all the parents and families of children that have been killed, lost and marooned after the various natural disasters that have happened in our world recently because of climate change conditions and all children in our world who have been brutally murdered in wars and disagreements. Listening and watching the various news programmes in recent months and watching tonight's Prime Time Investigates programme and reading the reports of what is happening to our young children and our youth in our beautiful country and world makes me wonder, "what life is really all about?"

Urgent action needs to happen now to address child and youth poverty in our country and world. There can be no delays or excuses. Our children have only one future and the future must happen for them now or we will have lost many of them before tomorrow even comes. I feel unless the issue is addressed straight away, child poverty will further entrench the existing two-tier society where the rich are getting richer and the poor are getting so much poorer and it will continue to blight and destroy children’s’ lives into the future. The number of children experiencing poverty and social exclusion in Ireland is appalling and it is a damning reflection of poor policy choices and decisions. Child poverty is not inevitable; it is often a result of an agenda that protects and favours the wealthiest to the detriment of the most vulnerable in society and those who have the least to give. It is simply unacceptable that children now represent almost 40% of all people in consistent poverty in our country of Ireland – this equates to close on 154,000 children. Too many children are growing up in hotel rooms; going to bed hungry and living in households struggling on inadequate incomes. In effect too many children are being denied a childhood. Children growing up in poverty tend to experience the same fate as adults and that is why it is imperative that we tackle child poverty now to prevent the further entrenchment of a two-tier society where the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. We have and especially the people in power have an opportunity to move away from the austere, punitive and regressive policies that were the hallmarks of people in authority and in power in the past and implement a more progressive approach that will make real inroads into child poverty and social exclusion. We need to hold people to account for the loss of even one child's life let alone the thousands of children that are been affected and in some cases left out to die so to speak on a daily basis in our beautiful country and world.

Remembering a Talisman

I also remember nine years ago to this very date being in Ethiopia adopting our second little girl and also returning from Ethiopia, Uganda, Kenya and parts of Africa this year and the tragedy, sadness and suffering I saw in some parts of those countries and other African countries was so sad. The people, especially the children in these countries such as Somalia, Ethiopia, Kenya, Niger, Malawi, Uganda, Burkina Faso and now from what I can read and see in our own country of Ireland need plenty of our help, support, action, love and prayers. Lets not forget that many children died needlessly in our own country of Ireland in state care in the last number of years. Also spare a thought for the other nine million little children who die globally each year in often horrendous circumstances, just because it is not on the News doesn't mean it's not a reality. We all should be ashamed. To live without hope is the most crushing of all burdens. Everywhere I have travelled over the last 27 years with my work in the developing world, especially in famine torn areas, I saw children with a look of despair. I was reminded of the words of the American writer James Agee, who said that: ‘ In every child who is born, under no matter what circumstances, the potentiality of the human race is born again, and in them too, once more and in each of us, is born again our terrific responsibility towards human life.’

After reading about the report recently where so many children have died in the Irish State’s care and the many children so horribly abused, I have started to hug my two little girls more tightly and I am thanking God for giving me the opportunity to have them in our lives and for the wonderful gift they are to my wife and myself. I remembered an event that I called "Ronan's Talisman" when I use to live in the Indian City of Calcutta and worked on the streets helping the poorest of the poor and wondered to myself how God could let people live in such dire and extreme poverty, especially all the children. Recently I have been reading over my diaries and stories from that time almost 28 years ago! Have you ever been in a time that is difficult to put into words? It reminds me of explaining a death of a loved one, a sun setting or rising, the love of a partner or the feeling you get when your favourite player scores a goal in a match. This was one of those time. At that time I do not believe I had ever been so exhausted from walking the streets of Calcutta feeding and attending to the poorest of the poor living in the extreme's of poverty that one couldn't even imagine. Before that day I thought I knew what it felt like to have my heart broken. Over my life I have seen poverty minutes from my home, in places in Galway, Offaly and Ireland and in far off countries such as Nepal, India, Ethiopia, Kenya, Uganda, Malawi, Angola, Sierra Leone and many other African countries. I have seen people hurt each other for no apparent reason. I have seen people been mean to their friends and families. I have seen people waste food, and been incredibly selfish. But this kind-of hurting and poverty I had never before had witnessed. As the Talisman quote of Mahatma Gandhi says, "I will give you a talisman. Whenever you are in doubt, or when the self becomes too much with you, apply the following test. Recall the face of the poorest and the weakest person whom you may have seen, and ask yourself, if the step you contemplate is going to be of any use to them. Will they gain anything by it? Will it restore them to a control over their own life and destiny? In other words, will it lead to swaraj [freedom] for the hungry and spiritually starving millions? Then you will find your doubts and your self melt away."

Nothing I have ever done or seen before or after has ever compared to that day. It was the day that life gave me my Talisman in the face and body of a child, the poorest and most vulnerable I have ever witnessed. I have never felt that small before or again. I am not sure if I was disgusted with myself or with others or with the world in general, but I felt dirty, and taking a shower that night and even now 27 years later has not helped me shake that feeling. That day I was sent to investigate a report that a young boy child was lying dying in a sewer in an alleyway close to a place called Howrah Railway Station. I made my way on foot about 2 miles from where I was staying to the particular alleyway that myself and one of Mother Teresa sisters were given. As we walked down the alleyway into the sewer area I noticed a little bundle and as I got closer i realised it was a little boy shivering with nothing only a lion-cloth around his waist and rats eating the back of his head and legs where he lay. I would like to say he looked good, but in all honesty he was not. He had some deformity to his face and ears and most of the back of his head had been eaten by the rats and was filled with maggots. People and children walked by. I thought those people and children who lived and worked in this slum area would understand what it means to be ostracised, poor, vulnerable and isolated. After hushing away the rats and cleaning some of his wounds, I noticed half of his body was paralyzed or did not function. He could not walk. he was incredibly dirty. There were maggots and puss in his ears and in his wounds on his head and legs. His scalp, what was left of it was dry. He had a bad skin disease. His nose was all dried up. He smelt so badly, but we cleaned him up and wrapped him up in a Indian longey and brought him back to one of the Mother Teresa clinics where in time he was eventually saved and cared for and looked after and where we found out his name was Laltu and how he was left an orphan on the streets to fend for himself and had the most unimaginable horrible things happen to him that should never ever happen to anyone let alone a young child of 6 years. I remember gritting my teeth that night as I left the clinic after caring all day for Laltu, and I tried to hold myself together as I walked to my bed in a communal room on Sudery street in the Salvation Army Hostel. I broke down once I got inside and into my bed. I cried my eyes out that night and my heart has been crying for children like Laltu ever since. A child who was made fun of, was abandoned and abused and had never seen any form of real kindness or love. Unfortunately there are many children all over the world and even in our country with similar stories especially those whom have been abused in all sorts of ways by evil adults. Again I asked God “how can you let these children live in this poverty? ”God replied through my prayers, “how can you?”

So I say to all of us here in Ireland, How can we? How can we stand by when so many children are living in poverty in our country and for all the many children that have been abused by evil adults in the past and not too distant past for that matter. Trust me I know!!! It is so important to do something special with your loved ones, especially your children because life is short and we must do all we can to protect them and give them real hope for the future, for they are our future. Please remember the children in need in our world, in our country of Ireland and indeed in our towns and villages throughout our beautiful country who all need our help, support, genuine care and prayers now, for tomorrow will be too late for a lot of them. I believe there can be a brighter future for our children in Ireland and indeed in our world, but we all must shoulder the burden to do all we can to protect and give genuine care to our children and indeed learn from what has happened in some of our institutions and many other situations of where the lives of children have been affected, or ended, that have surfaced in the last few years. I remember the following prayer poem called ‘To my Child’ written by Sally Meyer about her beautiful son, who has autism that I first saw on the wall of a children’s hospice I visited that went as follows and probably will mean so much to every parent after seeing what happened to little vulnerable children at the hands of people in our country and world over the years.

To My Child

”Just for this morning, I am going to smile when I see your face and laugh when I feel like crying. Just for this morning, I will let you choose what you want to wear, and smile and say how perfect it is. Just for this morning, I am going to step over the laundry, and pick you up and take you to the park and play. Just for this morning, I will leave the dishes in the sink, and let you teach me how to put that puzzle of yours together.

Just for this afternoon, I will unplug the telephone and keep the computer off, and sit with you in the backyard and blow bubbles. Just for this afternoon, I will not yell once, not even a tiny grumble when you scream and whine for the ice cream truck, and I will buy you one if he comes by. Just for this afternoon, I won’t worry about what you are going to be when you grow up, or second guess every decision I have made where you are concerned. Just for this afternoon, I will let you help me bake cakes, and I won’t stand over you trying to fix them. Just for this afternoon, I will take us to Supermac's and buy us both a Supermac's meal so we both can have toys.

Just for this evening, I will hold you in my arms and tell you a story about how you were born and how much i love you. Just for this evening, I will let you splash in the tub and not get angry. Just for this evening, I will let you stay up late while we sit on the porch and count all the stars. Just for this evening, I will snuggle beside you for hours, and miss my favorite TV shows. Just for this evening, when I run my fingers through your hair as you pray, I will simply be grateful that God has given me the greatest gift ever given.

I will think about the mothers and fathers who are searching for their missing children, the mothers and fathers dealing with their children who have suffered the evil of abuse, the mothers and fathers who are visiting their children’s graves instead of their bedrooms, and mothers and fathers who are in hospital rooms watching their children suffer senselessly, and screaming inside that they can’t handle it anymore. And when I kiss you good night, I will hold you a little tighter, a little longer. It is then, that I will thank God for you, and ask him for nothing, except one more day...'

Is our conscience gone?

I have worked for the NGO sector in many parts of the world for over two decades now and continue to do so in many parts of Africa. We struggle to raise our little budget each year so that we might be able to pay our African staff their very small and in some cases modest salaries and run programs that make the world operate a little better, a little kinder. We struggle because fundraising is not in our DNA. Somehow talking about asking for money, even to help children and people like Laltu seems difficult. And then we open up the news papers and find the pages full of articles about the ongoing Economic Crisis caused by greed, risk taking, misinformation, lack of regulation and control, poor governance and bad banking ethos. This economic crisis and enforced austerity has ruined the lives of many and put all our small businesses, companies, community, club and charity projects and organizations at so much risk. In fact many small businesses, community projects, clubs and charities have had to close down. I often wonder do we as a people even have a conscience left any more! Or will we continue to lie down in the face of this economic crisis. Or will we stand up for the future of our greatest treasure – our children - on whose shoulders we have already put our future existence. It is so important to do something special with your loved ones, especially your children because life is short and we must do all we can to protect them and give them real hope for the future, for they are our future. Please remember the children in need in our world, in our country of Ireland and indeed in our towns and villages throughout our beautiful country who all need our help, support, genuine care and prayers now, for tomorrow will be too late for a lot of them. I believe there can be a brighter future for our children in Ireland and indeed in our world, but we all must shoulder the burden to do all we can to protect and give genuine care to our children and indeed learn from what has happened in some of our institutions and many other situations of where the lives of children have been affected, or ended, that have surfaced in the last few years. Some of the images from my years of working in the developing world have faded from memory rather quickly, but I think that this one, along with some of the others I experienced during my times living in India and various parts of Africa of street children scavenging for food from trash bins and rubbish dumps won't fade any time soon. But by been positive where we can, by been supportive of ourselves and our communities, by helping which doesn’t always cost money and by showing leadership as best we can as we go into the twilight of our years and as we enter the end of days in our own journey through life we can give true hope to our children. PLEASE let’s do it!

As a final thought, look after your greatest treasure which is your children as this is a crucial time for them and for us and for all our children in Ireland and in our world. If we believe in the goodness of one another and in the true sense of community and care and genuine love for another then we will do whatever we can to help, care, support and love everyone in as much as we humanly can for there are a lot of people and especially children in need in our county, our country and our world! I pray now for children in our communities who live without either of their parents: children whose parents have died, children taken away from their parents because of abuse or neglect, children that have been abandoned or have experienced been unloved and uncared for and children who have run away from home. You care for these little ones God, and not one of them is lost from your sight. Guide, guard and protect these children as they move in with relatives or caring families, as they live with foster parents or adopted parents into new families or as they struggle on the street or in homeless shelters. Comfort each one who feels unloved, unwanted, uncared for and afraid. Give wisdom to people especially those in power who make decisions about children’s lives that they will make a difference for good in children’s lives. Empower those who care for them to be loving, caring, trustworthy and compassionate. Instil in our government leaders a passion and a will for protecting the most vulnerable especially our children in most need. Help us to reach out as individuals, parents and as a community to those who live without the protection and love of parents or family or indeed friends. We also pray for parents and children who have been wrongly separated, that you will end their agony and help them to be reunited. We pray this prayer for everyone’s need but especially for our children and the world’s children that they may be cared for, loved and given the chance and right to life that every child deserves. Amen.