Is there a mother in the country, whose heart doesn't clench a little, when the Australian media reports the disappearance of a teenage boy? Is there a family in Queensland who didn't watch, perhaps unwillingly but watch nonetheless, as developments unfolded in the search for missing teenager, Daniel Morcombe? A mother whose heart doesn't ache for the suffering etched on Denise Morcombe's face? I wonder how many prayers were uttered on behalf of this family, from pulpits and pews in Australia last weekend? They were heard in the church I attended. How many parents and siblings wonder how it must be, to be Daniel's twin brother, growing up and living with what might have happened to Daniel? Bradley Morcombe talked about his brother in 2009, about his first attendance at school without his twin, about missing him constantly. Perhaps mothers are not the only people whose hearts ache when they hear news about missing children.
While the Morecombe family continues an experience that must be excruciatingly painful, we are watching a family confronted with evil of a kind most of us can barely imagine. We are watching a family living so as to oppose it. The loss of a son and brother has taken this family into determined, effective charitable action on behalf of lost children and their parents. See the bottom of this page for links to the charity. Evil touches our lives in a variety of ways. Reading the media on the kinds of things criminals interviewed in the Morcombe case had to say about what happens to children who are snatched, abused and killed, is like looking into the face of pure evil.
Anyone with a BA including a little sociology can tell us the popular stance on childhood. It’s something we created and in the past people didn’t treasure children the way we do now. We ‘created’ childhood, as a stage of life that requires protection and special care. However, reading the pages of the Christian Bible, one finds a wealth of reference to the value of children. Jesus of Nazareth said that ‘the Kingdom of Heaven belongs to such as these.’ (Mark 10:14) That part of our heritage which is Christian includes both the reality of suffering and hardship in children’s lives, and a reason for treasuring our children. It is they to whom the ‘kingdom of heaven’ belongs,
The danielmorcombe foundation can be located by clicking on this link.
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