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The
beauty of charity
Patrice
Whitehorne, Youthlink
Writer
THERE ARE
three virtues that are spoken of continually in the Bible - hope, love and charity.
But charity is the greatest of the three. Charity in the biblical sense encompasses
the pure love of Christ and covers a wide range of principles like loving others
as ourselves, providing service to others, giving to the poor, showing kindness,
having a pure heart and pure motives. Although
in a wider sense, charity refers mainly to giving willing of yourself and what
you have without expecta-tions of anything in return. It's about self-sacrifice
and helping others just because you care. While some of us may immediately see
why charity is so important, others may still be left wondering. For their benefit,
here are a few reasons: Teaches
self-value When
we give freely of ourselves and help others, we develop a better sense of self-worth
and our self-esteem gets a major boost! So, even though you had no intention of
gaining anything, you do end up gaining something, maybe not in a physical way,
but definitely in an emotional and self-respecting way. Also,
when we give to the less fortunate, we learn to be more grateful for what we have
in our lives. Encourages
understanding and tolerance Many
times people are judgmental of those who are less fortunate or who have made bad
choices in their lives, and justify their unkindness to such persons by saying
that they got themselves into the particular situation; whether this is true or
not, is not important. Charity
teaches us to look past that and to focus on the person and their needs; it helps
us to love more purely and less conditionally. When we learn to care about others
around us we become more understanding and more tolerant of people. Brings
us closer to God Through
charity, we are able to gain a better understanding of God and to better appreciate
His great love for us. Charity
is beautiful because there is so much that we can learn from putting it into practice.
Showing
charity doesn't mean you have to do something huge. When
it comes to helping children living with AIDS and wards of the SOS Children's
Village, there is never hesitation from Montego Bay's 'unofficial charity workers'.
From left: Michele Rollins, Elisabeth Simonitsch, Bob Trench, general manager
of the Ritz-Carlton Rose Hall, and Moyra Fitzroy. They all came out recently to
support Noa Jensch's Christmas Charity Bazaar on the terrace of the Rose Hall
resort. - Photo by Janet Silvera | 
