Who is my neighbor?

Something today reminded me of a conversation between my daughter and me about a year ago (she was 5) in the car (where all the best conversations happen) going through downtown KC.

A : Why are there people under that bridge? It's cold out.

Me : Well, um, yeah, well, um, they live there honey.

A : why?

Me : they have no other place to go.

A : Can't they go home?

Me : No, they can't, they don't have one.

A : can't their mother give them a place to live if they don't have a home?

Me : my guess is honey they don't have any family to live with.

A : (starts crying) Mama, I think we should give them a home to live in or they can stay with us.

I remember at that point, all I could respond with was, "I wish we could honey."

She had not yet developed that callousness of they're probably drunks, or addicts, or too lazy to work, or any of the other snap judgments people tend to make. I always give the guy on the corner a dollar if I have one. I'd like to give him the benefit of the doubt that this dollar matters in his day.

When I hear projects to help those in need, it's easy to get caught up in the big ones that sound impressive or the exotic ones in other countries.... and I'm not discounting those programs at all, but I wonder how we (me) can find the invisible neighbors. The neighbor we don't see that sits in the back row of church and doesn't say a word, or the elderly neighbor on our street who never has a visitor, or even the kid that we see that just doesn't seem to belong.

I'm still working on how I can take these musings and use my life to help the invisible neighbors. Until I do, I think my life is incomplete and not totally compatible with the way I want to live my life.