Encountering injustice: guilt, conscientisation and advocacy

Volunteering brought participants face to face with the marginalised inhabitants of the city. The guilt, anger and powerlessness this induced were reflected in the data. Volunteers found themselves embedded in ‘structural sin’.⁵ People felt frustrated at the smallness of what they could do and the sense of being caught up in secular culture and its de-personalisation. These extracts from reflective writing and participant observation notes illustrate this:

A number of things struck me over my placement at Christian Kitchen in Walthamstow. First was how stratified UK society is. There is a whole group of people who are completely overlooked and seem to survive, hidden and interweaved in our daily lives without us knowing it.... So often I find myself being judgemental. The lines which separate our lives are so fine. It could have been me and yet, it is them and they are so good.... How fine the line is which divides people, destinies are. It is by the grace of God that we fall one side or the next. Yet there is no line, we are one really. I was really in a bad place in Nov 2008 and without the support of the ones who love me I could have been there. Seeing love working where you do not expect to find it is a blessing. This is where I find the Examen prayer so powerful: you see God present in your life every day.

(Reflective Writing Two)

Bea’s story: Bea described a visit to someone who is mentally unstable, living in poverty and totally disorganised.... Bea described her frustration - there was so little she could do for him, other than simply visit him - and she felt that the social services he needed simply weren’t available. So she questioned the value of her visiting him - but having voiced all this, she came back to thinking that in the end, she wasn’t there to sort out practicalities - she was there just as a friend.

(Participant Observation One)

Isabel’s story: Isabel feels bad.... She often feels frustrated about her inability to do more for the people she tries to support. She realises that she is very demanding with herself and needs to remind herself that finally it is God who does these things through her.... She realises also that one can get used to the misery you see when you try to help destitute people.

(Participant Observation Three)

This issue was picked up as one of particular significance in the Joint Feedback Meeting between insider and outsider teams:

The issue of feelings of guilt/frustration/anger at the tiny fraction of help volunteers are able to provide those on the margins of society compared with the amount of evident need, was a recurring theme. This led on to the question of whether and when volunteers should be wary of simply propping up a system that cares very inadequately for the weak and vulnerable and the ‘losers’ in society. Should we, instead, be moving towards an ‘advocacy’ style of support, so that, rather than just accepting the status quo and trying to alleviate in very small ways, the sufferings of those who are victims of today’s go-getting society, we are challenging and seeking to change the circumstances which cause the problems in the first place. It was suggested that the contemplative/ reflective approach of the group process might not lend itself very well to challenge and advocacy, but reference was made to the Ignatian principle of “contemplation in action” and to a document available online describing a process of ‘Ignatian Advocacy’ produced by the Jesuit European Office (www.ocope.info/index.php?id=194). This might indicate ways in which advocacy could be developed within the work of LJVs.

(Minutes of Joint Feedback Meeting, p 2)⁶

Interestingly, one member of the MSJC team suggested that what counted as ‘guilt’ in the United Kingdom might be viewed as ‘conscientization’ in, for example, South America - and that this liberation perspective might possibly provide LJVs with an alternative way of approaching issues of social justice. Discernment of this issue of felt guilt and the action it called for was a major learning for the LJV leadership.