President Monson Talks about Humanitarian Service
A couple weeks ago, President Monson sat down with the Church News to talk about the Church’s years of humanitarian assistance and what it means to him and the Church. The Church adding “caring for the poor and needy” to its missions certainly was directed by our beloved prophet. Below are a few selections of what he said:
[In seeing so much human suffering around us,] “Do we have a responsibility to do something about such suffering?”
The answer, he says, is always the same: “Yes! We are our brother’s keeper.“
President Monson said the Church takes most seriously the admonition from the Lord to feed the hungry, clothe the naked and visit the sick (see Matthew 25).
[The assistance is not limited to a certain people.] “I think we should not put an artificial border around need,” he said. “The Lord didn’t and we shouldn’t.”
“We don’t like to see other people suffer while we have much,” President Monson said. “I think that is particularly true with regard to children. Show me a man who doesn’t tear up when he sees children who are in need. I don’t think you will find a real man who doesn’t feel that way.”
President Monson told a story from his childhood of how his mother took great care of the homeless who would pass by their home. That had an effect on him.
President Monson said the problem with giving humanitarian aid worldwide can be summarized in a simple quote from Anne Morrow Lindbergh in her book Gift from the Sea: “My life cannot implement in action the demands of all the people to whom my heart responds.”
President Monson said if a person looks at all the major needs for humanitarian aid, it is easy to become discouraged because of an inability to help everyone.
“The Church is a worldwide Church. We are just as interested in a starving child in Africa as we are a well-fed child in Los Angeles. We have to rally our resources and analyze where we can be of help.”
“We got out of our own wards, and out of our own stakes and out of our own country and realized that there was suffering. These are God’s children and they need to be helped.”
“Starvation is starvation. Human beings dying are human beings dying. … I have seen enough to convince me where there is want and where there is suffering I would like to be there to lend a helping hand.”
President Monson summarized his remarks:
“Those who have much should be more generous in helping those who have none,” President Monson said.
See the following link for the full story from the Church News:
