thought provoking quotes

"While charity has its place, it is important to reflect on our motivations for undertaking such work. We must look behind the veil of humanitarianism to understand how our own motivations might clash with the needs and desires of those whom we hope to serve."

"Charity focuses our attention on the comfortable, familiar domain of the giver, while justice demands that we focus our attention on the unseemly and disturbing world of those on the receiving end. In charity, we can send some surplus supplies abroad, or we can give our time and skills to those in need. But, to arrive at justice, we are required to take a far more arduous journey. We need to understand the needs and desires of the poor as well as the forces that constrain their hopes or very existence."

"I had learned a valuable lesson about working with the poor. I had come to see them as people first and not as objects of my own benevolence or charity. By caring for them, I had come to respect them. My relationship could no longer be one seen through the lens of charitable work. I had begun to see their problems as our problems."

Quotes from the book "Awakening Hippocrates", by Edward O'Neil, Jr., MD