Only, 24 Hours from Tulsa…

People often say to me, ‘we live in a 24 x 7 culture now’ and on some levels I would have to agree. We can go shopping anytime we like. We can go to the pictures on a Sunday afternoon. We can transfer money from our bank accounts to someone elses bank account at 2 in the morning. On the surface, it would seem that the pattern of life that was well established for many years - working week Monday to Friday (or Saturday) 9ish to 5ish and Sundayoff to do nothing (because there was nothing to do) - has gone forever. But look a little beneath the surface and you will find that things aren’t so different after all.

2 weeks ago I got the most terrible toothache I have ever had. I couldn’t speak, all I could do was either whimper or scream as the pain threatened to consume me totally. It was a Saturday so no dentist to go to. We ring the emergency dentist number and after going through a long list of questions we are told that the nearest emergency service to us is in Moss Side near Manchester, about 6 miles away. So off we trot to find it. The pain has not subsided so I lie in the back of the car and writhe around. We get to the dentist and guess what - there isn’t one. So we ring again and it seems that if we can get to Macclesfield by 4 (10 miles the complete opposite direction from our house) then we may be able to see someone there. I eventually had the offending tooth removed 2 days ago. Hardly a 24 x 7 service.

Yesterday I heard a really sad story of how a young mum threw herself under a train at the weekend. She was a patient at a local psychiatric hospital and was thus suffereing from some mental disorder. It seems she was strongly encouraged to go home for the weekend, probably because the hospital didn’t have the resources to look after her. Well it is the weekend.

We are either 24 x 7 or we’re not. At the moment the wealthy people of this land enjoy a 24 x 7 experience of late night banking and even later night food consumption whilst the poorer people suffer a 24 x 7 experience of long hours and irregular shift patterns. This is not fair. We should all be prepared to change our lives a little.

I have written on many occasions in this blog about changing the shape of our spiritual lives, gone is the day of the golden hour on a Sunday. We need to do more that, we need to be prepared to change our lives completely, to show some solidarity with the people who currently have to work the hours we choose not to and to be able to provide people with what they really need 24 x 7 - a dentist or a safe place to be - and not just what they want.