by Janay Garrick, a Pioneers advocate for Children at Risk

“This baby was rescued from the cho by a good samaritan.”
“The cho? What’s a cho?”
“The toilet.”
“Oh.”

I blink
and picture
the baby beside a porcelain bowl
swaddled upon a clean, western-tiled floor
but this is East Africa,
Kenya, to be exact and I know of
no such chos except in the houses of
the rich, the few and far between.

I summon
the courage to clarify
and picture the true picture:
baby Joel drowning in a pit latrine
lying and dying in feces and urine,
someone – his mom? – had dropped
him in there.

…but a Samaritan, as he passed by,
came to where the hurting child was
and when he saw him,
he took pity on him…

God,
as Your people,
give us Your strength
to picture the true pictures
to stay on the right side of the road –
where the hurting people lie,
where the abandoned children cry.

Don’t let “distance be the enemy of Africa.”
don’t let us distance ourselves
from the needs
we see
and feel
and hear about.

Amen.