What should we then do?

A number of people I know have been working hard to deliver a report upon conditions in six of Haiti's internally-displaced persons' camps (called "We've Been Forgotten": Conditions in Haiti's Displacement Camps Eight Months After the Earthquake"). I think you should take a look at it.

It's not that the results of the survey are surprising (Spoiler alert!: Conditions are deplorable), but rather because if you're reading this blog, there's a good chance you're interested in what's happening in Port-au-Prince.

I know it can be difficult to delve into the details of a long report, but I'd encourage you to pick a chapter that focuses on a camp and zero in on the account of one of the surveyed families. It's not too difficult to find news articles with quotations from government officials or aid groups explaining the difficulties in providing aid and helping families resettle. It's another thing to choose to enter into the hardships of our brothers and sisters in the camps.

So after reading, what should we then do? It's hard for me to say. I pass by these camps everyday and don't have the slightest idea how as an individual I can make a difference with problems as seemingly intractable as they are. I can imagine how being at an even greater remove can make it more confounding.

So, at a minimum, I try to enter in. This is a self-centered response, but one that hopefully has outward effects. I want to keep my heart raw to remain empathetic. When I choose to look away time and time again and not burden my mind with the plight of others, I become so self-interested that my ability to love is stifled. So whether it's the suffering of Haitians in a tent city for 8 months or Sudanese in the Kakuma refugee camp in Kenya for decades or the newly homeless fellow down the street, I don't want to forget that these are all people of great worth. They deserve so much better than where they find themselves.

So yes—back to the report. It's intended for policy-makers, with recommendations to improve aid distribution in the camps. But if you don't count yourself among them, maybe you could use it as a tool to expand your heart and mind today and to try to remember to do small acts of compassion with great love?