Enough

I had a moment of panic tonight - in fact, I can still feel my heart racing. After waiting all day for my student loan payments to auto-debit, I login to my account - and see numbers screaming at me that are DOUBLE what I thought I owed! Money's been tight lately, but I had these payments all planned out - so how could this be?! I felt like bursting into tears...but I tried to stay calm. Upon further investigation, the monthly payment was what I thought it should be - but since the auto debit was still "pending" according to my bank (due to snow? who knows...) it was past the due date and so my "minimum payment due" was listing the amount for both months combined.

Whew. What a relief to discover that I did not in fact owe more money than I had! But it gave me a moment of insight into the stress caused by poverty. If this one scare caused me such panic and distress, I cannot imagine what it must feel like to carry that constant weight of not knowing if you'll have enough - or knowing for a fact that you won't have enough, and trying to do whatever you can to somehow make ends meet. In the academic world "social stress theory" demonstrates how the extreme and constant stress experienced simply by living in poverty has significant and lasting impacts on people's physical, mental and emotional health - and every aspect of their life. Poverty literally makes you sicker - and decreases your quality of life in so many ways.

I have had the privilege to grow up and live most of my 26 years without having to worry about how I'm going to pay my bills. I have always had enough, and most of the time more than enough. It is only recently that this has become something that I must be more conscious of - and ironically, even as I have been worrying about making my student loan payments, I have also been convicted of all of the "excess" that I have. I have multiple coats, scarves and gloves to choose from when going out in the cold - even though the farthest I have to go is from my house to my car. I have a car, making transportation something I don't have to think about, rather than an impossible barrier. I can afford to turn my heat on, even if I keep it low. I can't truthfully say "there's no food in the house" - even if I've run out of leftovers, my cupboards and freezer still have plenty. I have extra medicine, shampoo, umbrellas, you name it - and extra clothes that I have to periodically get rid of! And perhaps most importantly, I have the social supports available to help me when I do come up short, rather than being at the mercy of creditors.

In short, I really have no idea what it feels like to live in poverty - I have a privileged life, which I am grateful for, but which also gives me greater responsibility. Somewhere Jesus talks about how if you have two cloaks and your brother has none, you are stealing from him. I feel like this is Jesus' challenge to me as well. As I become more conscious of the limits of my material resources, the temptation is to hold onto them. Yet in recognizing all that I have been given, I want to be just as willing to give it away - trusting that God will continue to provide me with enough, and knowing that my "excess" can be someone else's "enough".

A posture of giving...
Courtesy of Catholic Lane