I kept watching this sight for a while during the morning walk!
Fifteen lives fell to the bullets of two shooters in the Sydney beach a week ago.
Since then, thousands have visited the Bondi beach with floral tributes and some meeting with the bereaved families.
The families who lost their loved ones, while sharing their grief and loss remember others in grief.
A photo of some strangers sitting with a mother who lost her child in the shoot out was a moving sight. The strangers had tears in their eyes!
The leaf in the photo above, stopped the bud from falling to the ground. The fallen bud is sheltered !
To me, it became a symbol of how much we feel beholden to others !
I happened to watch the Baccalaureate service of Christian Medical College Vellore, few months ago, where a lady student was seated in a wheel chair. She had sustained a spinal cord injury and was sheltered by her classmates to support her to complete her undergraduate course. On enquiry I was moved to find out that her friends surrounded her with attention and care during the four years.
What is one bud after all, when there are other buds in the plant! The message of that fallen bud sheltered by a leaf, represents a truth that a plant defends life and grieves its loss.
What a contrast to this, is when we read and view news about the state of affairs in Ukraine, Gaza and other parts of the world where humans intentionally harm others and deny them of the right to live!
Amidst this insanity, the call that comes to me from the fallen bud sheltered by a leaf is that the Good Samaritan attended to the needs of a fallen man who was waylaid and injured by robbers! Jesus spoke this parable to suggest. 'who is our neighbour'! Every 'fallen person' unable to fend for himself or herself is our neighbour!
I read the story of the Tribal Health Initiative at Sittling, in Harur district of Tamil Nadu in the Times India newspaper last week. Drs Regi George and Lalitha Regi set up this project in 1993, in a tribal area to bring health care, organic farming, tribal handicraft marketing, and for training tribal women to offer community based heath care! Theirs was a way of attending to the needs of marginalised people in the society! It is a model of how 'fallen people' are being sheltered by the initiatives of a doctor couple!
It is a good theme to ponder upon during a week, when the birth of Jesus of Nazareth is being remembered globally!
Jesus lived His life seeking after the 'fallen people' !
The Hibiscus leaf cradling a fallen bud has awakened my consciousness to realities of loss and grief that people live with !
M.C.Mathew (text and photo)
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