Clinic Cases September 2019

Koinonia – a transliterated form of a Greek word that appears 19 times in most editions of the Greek New Testament. Its essential meaning embraces concepts conveyed in the English terms community, communion, joint participation, sharing and intimacy.

Each of us is here for a brief sojourn; for what purpose he knows not, though he sometimes thinks he feels it. But from the viewpoint of daily life – without going deeper – we exist for each other; in the first place, for those on whose smiles and welfare all our happiness depends, and next, for all those unknown to us personally, with whose destinies we are bound up by the tie of sympathy. A hundred times every day I remind myself that my inner and outer life depends on the labors of others, living and dead, and that I must exert myself in order to give in the same measure as I have received and am still receiving.

Albert Einstein
from The World As I See It

Our lives need to reflect the reality that God gave us as gift to each other.

Gerard Thomas Straub
Posted in Reflections

As I sit in my office I can hear the volunteers playing in the patio with the children. Our volunteers are usually young college students or persons that have recently graduated and are working. We have also hosted families and student groups from the US. A retired couple from Florida and their relative, all in their 70’s, have volunteered yearly for the last 10 years. Our oldest volunteer was 78 years young. He would come yearly and spend 3 to 4 months with us until God called him home. These persons who volunteer with us epitomize the spirit of koinonia by giving of themselves, by forming a community and by entering into communion with ill, destitute children, offering them love, encouragement and a reason to continue their healing process. Instead of laying out on a beach somewhere, instead of traveling for pleasure, they come to share their lives with children who lack the basic necessities of life. I am sure you have heard the expression, “I received more from those I cared for than I gave to them.” Many have told us that their time with the children was a life-changing experience and many volunteers return to continue their life-giving service. They have realized that only in serving others, only in looking beyond their own needs and desires can their lives be whole and complete.

To enter into the lives of children who are ill, who cannot ambulate, who require help with bathing, toileting, eating requires compassion, a virtue so essential in our world but, at times, so difficult to embrace.

Compassion asks us to go where it hurts, to enter into the places of pain, to share in brokenness, fear, confusion, and anguish. Compassion challenges us to cry out with those in misery, to mourn with those who are lonely, to weep with those in tears. Compassion requires us to be weak with the weak, vulnerable with the vulnerable, and powerless with the powerless. Compassion means full immersion in the condition of being human.

Henri J.M. Nouwen

Our children are a community. They enter into communion with one another. Compassion for one another is evident as they help one another, console one another, and reach out to one another. Our volunteers are amazed at the interaction of our children with each other. There is no avarice, no envy, no competition. They give themselves freely and totally to one another and in so doing emulate the Divine Trinity and make the world a better place, a place where koinonia flourishes.

The following prayer, attributed to Saint Francis of Assisi, although its true origin is unknown, sums up perfectly the spirit of koinonia.

Lord, make me an instrument of your peace;
where there is hatred, let me sow love,
where there is injury, pardon,
where there is doubt, faith,
where there is despair, hope,
where there is darkness, light,
and where there is sadness, joy.
O Divine Master,
grant that I may not so much seek
to be consoled as to console,
to be understood as to understand,
to be loved as to love,
for it is in giving that we receive,
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned,
and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.

We thank you for helping us care for our children. We love you and wish you God’s peace.