It's Christmas in Crazy Bangkok

Today feels like the first day of Christmas for me.  Like my life in Bangkok, it speaks of contradictions and anomolies.  So why today and why contradictions and anomolies? 

Well, it actually started late yesterday with an email from Australia which shared the simple consideration of a priest back home for me.  His simple gesture touched me and put me in touch with mum and dad as they knew him down the coast and they always saw him as a lovely priest. 

Then later in the evening, I got another email from a local source sharing an enquiry from another lovely priest but on the local scene and not so simple a message.  This priest is a great guy working here many years with the poor.  He is an absolute character and I never doubt that his heart is in the right place.  It just is that his way of operating in mission is not so simple.  He runs a huge concern for the poor with a huge number of staff and a big budget.  Last night's request from him shared with me concerned his trying to trace a certain individual who turned out to be a billionaire who wants to give away his fortune. 

When I eventually found out what Father was about - trying to connect with a billionaire - I was just flabbergasted.  Why did it hit me the way it did? 

I also am a priest working with the poor and try to get money and other help for the people I touch in my ministry but my approach is much simpler.  Is it too simple? 

I want and have always wanted to be a priest.  For me, to be a priest is not meant to be complicated.  It is meant to be a simple life long quest where I reach out to others because of my sense of gratitude in life and my commitment to the gospel.  The idea of turning this life long quest into big business with a big budget horrifies me and is just not my idea of priesthood and ministry. 

Yes, the people I work with are desperate and need help.  I then ask myself why one group of the poor should attract more attention and giving than another.  Is it just because one leader of mission is more entrepreneurial than another?  That does not seem fair but life is not fair.  Maybe I should be more entrepreneurial but I don't want ministry to become big business as I believe that it then becomes something it is not meant to be - a business venture.  It becomes something that cannot be carried out everyday by everyday Christians.  Rather it becomes the realm of Christian and yes, gospel motivated, individuals who operate as entrepreneurs.  Mission becomes reduced to being about big business and that is not the way to go as mission is for every Christian in their daily lives as they struggle to live the gospel. 

Maybe I am being too simple but then I am confirmed in my views by what I share in today - Christmas at BRC. 

Today we have the annual Christmas party at the Bangkok Refugee Centre (BRC) for the refugees.  It is run as a fun day for the refugees by the refugees together with those who help them and have a mission to them.  It is a simple fair where they enjoy the spirit and the entertainment of the season and receive some little gift and food.  It is all quite simple but involves many and there is a great spirit.  It is what Christmas is all about -  people just being good with and for others.  Why can't it be Christmas every day of the year?  This is what ministry is all about, empowering people to reach out to each other and help each other along the way, no matter who they are and definitely not based on having a big budget.  And if it was Christmas each day, we would be people of good spirit and giving every day and we would not need to turn to big business to look after the poor and all that goes with that option -  getting into management and bureaucracies and hustle and bustle of meetings.  Is this not the way of the gospel - simple reaching out to each other because we are all human beings created by the one God?