Hungry Hearts

I was recently at a local shopping mall, where I heard the barking of a dog from a pram.  Huh?  Then, I saw a young woman come out of a restaurant to attend to the dog, in the pram, feeding it milk, from a baby's bottle.  I was in shock, being dismayed, horrified and just plain upset.  

My first thought was there are children starving and homeless in the country next door, because of a war, and here is a woman babying a dog.  I saw this as narcissistic behavior, wasting money and love on a dog in such a selfish way, while poor and suffering people need our attention and care.  I was stuck by how wrong this was.  I could have gone totally askew in my thinking, until a thought came to me.  

This woman is lacking something in her life.  She is hungry for something much deeper and not getting it.  So this fluffy little dog becomes the substitute, the focus of her care and love, instead of a real person.  What is going on here?  

I can only speculate from my own stance in life.  Sometime later, I find someone who supports me in my mental discomfort and assures me that I am on the right track - St John Paul II.  His welcome reality check is clear and simple: 

"Only a person can love and only a person can be loved. Love is an ontological and ethical requirement of the person. The person must be loved, since love alone corresponds to what the person is."  

Our world is a fragile place, with more than its fair share of conflict, division and fear.  Within such a world, people are hungry for more than food to eat.  They are hungry for love, for peace, for a sense of security, for belonging for hope.  These are deep, human hungers, spiritual hungers.  They will not be satisfied in individual pursuits, worldly comforts, nor personal abuse of power.    

As we pursue life, healthily nourishing our human hungers, the words of another Pope may speak to us.  They are from Pope Francis' prayer for Grandparents' Day 2024:  

"Lord, faithful God, do not allow anyone to be cast aside.

May your Spirit of love fill us with Your tenderness 

and teach us to say : 'I will not abandon you!' to those we meet on our journey. 

With the help of your beloved Son, 

may we not lose the taste for fraternity 

and may we not conform to the sadness of loneliness. 

Help us to look to the future with renewed hope."