Column for May 3, 2012

It is not all that unusual for me to be stuck in a hotel room instead of being with my family at night.  I occasionally have to travel for my job, and thankfully it is not an every week thing.  Though I would much rather be at home with my toddler saying “Hold me, Daddy!” because he is a bit jealous of the new baby and enjoying a home cooked meal with my family, this is a small sacrifice that I have to occasionally make in order to keep and properly execute my position of employment.  How is all of this relevant?  Well, it relates to the frustration my wife and I experienced this past weekend.

We were shopping for some household essentials, and we were not sure how we were going to pay for all that we put into our shopping cart.  I understand being on a tight budget.  I have gone through periods of lean times.  I have gone through periods of abundance, as well.  My wife has not been working for three years now, and we are minus an entire paycheck each and every pay period.  However, we decided that we would suffer through anything we had to in order to allow her to stay at home and raise our children rather than her work to have just enough to pay some day care center employees do it for us.  Add to that the high utility bills in Selma, a mortgage, car payments, and now a monthly payment for an expensive new air conditioning system, and we have a tighter than desired monthly budget.

Ahead of us in line at the checkout was a couple with at least one infant (that is all I saw at the time) paying for their groceries with three separate transactions.  The first was a WIC voucher, the second was paid for with a food stamp card and a little bit of cash, and the third was yet another WIC voucher.  My wife and I just looked at each other in wonder.  We had three children with us and a full grocery cart.  We had to come up with a method of paying for our own groceries and there we were helping pay for the groceries that were purchased in front of us as well.

Add to that the frustration that the couple were definitely “English as a Second Language” class candidates of most likely questionable legal status, and we were all the more frustrated.  According to the Center for Immigration Studies (as long ago as 2004), the costs of food stamp, WIC and free school lunch programs to "illegal alien households" costs approximately $1.9 billion per year.  I almost wanted to follow Julio and Maria home and let them serve us supper.  After all, we helped pay for it.  As we were leaving the checkout lane, what did we see behind us?  Another couple with a food stamp card in hand to tender payment for the cart load of groceries.  I am reminded of a quote I read recently from one of our Founding Fathers.

"The government of the United States is a definite government, confined to specified objects.  It is not like the state governments, whose powers are more general.  Charity is no part of the legislative duty of the government."

~ James Madison, Speech, House of Representatives, during the debate "On the Memorial of the Relief Committee of Baltimore, for the Relief of St. Domingo Refugees" (January 10, 1794)

My wife and I attend a church congregation in Garner.  It is a bit far to go for worship services, but we chose that group of believers out of relationship and preference.  We have been overwhelmed with the graciousness of our church family yet again, who love to bless people in that congregation with meals whenever someone is sick or has a newborn baby.  Others have been blessed as well, going through the loss of a family member.  That is what the Body of Christ is supposed to do to minister to one another.  Locally, there is a church right down the street from my house that gives away groceries every Thursday to people in need.  I just wish I didn’t see some of the same cars and people there week after week, still in need.

As James Madison realized, it is the job of the Church to provide such charity, not necessarily that of the government.  As I am away from my family as a result of being willing to work some long hours and make some small sacrifices in order to feed my family, I am also reminded of the Bible verse in 2 Thessalonians3:10 “... if any would not work, neither should he eat.”  Nonetheless, I am still frustrated in seeing others eat at the expense of others every time I go to the grocery store.