Lent 2025 Day 18: The Cost of Cruelty & The Weight of Shame
- Flannel Diaries
- Mar 25
- 4 min read
“When a poor person dies of hunger, it has not happened because God did not take care of him or her. It has happened because neither you nor I wanted to give that person what he or she needed.” – Mother Teresa
Shame is Dangerous.
It ruins lives. It breaks relationships. It destroys families. It kills people.
It took me a long time to process the death of my friend, Asal, and even longer to confront the lies we tell ourselves when someone chooses to take their own life. We comfort ourselves with false narratives—that we couldn’t have done anything, that we didn’t see the signs, that they wouldn’t have accepted our help.
But the truth is, we miss things—because sometimes, we need to miss them. We compartmentalize suffering to avoid disrupting our own comfort. We don’t want our “normal” to be affected. We don’t want other people’s struggles to disrupt our “happy.”
The Normalization of Cruelty.
Nothing is normal right now. But we are trying to normalize cruelty.
We are watching funding for education, healthcare, food assistance, and social safety nets disappear. Watching our government strip resources from the most vulnerable while handing tax breaks to billionaires.
Who are we?
How did we get to a place where half the country is okay with taking food out of children's mouths so the ultra-wealthy can hoard more? How do people not understand that the economy doesn’t function without people, labor, and purchasing power? Not corporations. Not GDP figures. People.
I actually took an economics course. Unlike many with opinions online, I’ve studied the real impact of privatizing public goods.
And let me tell you: it is the worst idea ever.
I come from a country where corruption thrives through the privatization of public resources. Where government officials line their pockets while citizens live in poverty, desperate for basic services. The class divide in the Philippines is staggering. And now, we are watching our own country head in the same direction.
And what happens when it all collapses?
Unlike banks, I don’t believe this administration will be willing to bail out its citizens when the crash comes. Because it will come. That’s what happens when you elect leaders who don’t care about your well-being. Leaders who tell you to blame marginalized communities for your struggles instead of looking at the actual systems that are exploiting all of us. It doesn’t take an advanced degree to see what’s happening. Just life experience.
The Weight of Shame & The Lies We Tell Ourselves:
People blame others for their mistakes because they fear being seen as lacking. We are terrified of being judged. We convince ourselves we are good people who don’t care about status or wealth. But we live in a society that judges poverty as a moral failing. We look at unhoused people and assume their situation is their fault—as if capitalism isn’t a machine built on exploiting labor while paying the bare minimum. Some people simply aren’t built for this system.
Most of us who do keep playing the game are barely surviving it. We’re lucky to have weekends to lie face-down in bed, recovering from exhaustion.
Why do we care so much about how people ended up in poverty? We know how. The better question is: What are we doing to help them? The truth? It doesn’t cost much. In fact, it costs more to criminalize poverty and incarcerate people than it does to provide housing, food, and social services.
And yet, people fight against solutions because they don’t want a few pennies of their tax dollars to go toward helping others.
Christians say they follow Jesus, yet they actively want to harm the least among us. It’s disgusting. It’s hypocritical. And I don’t blame people for running away from religion when the loudest voices in faith communities are the ones using their Bibles as weapons while committing the very sins they preach against.
I don’t have patience for it anymore.
My Rage is Justified.
I am angry.
I have so much rage inside me.
But unlike those who refuse to take accountability, I am willing to own my mistakes. I want to be better. I want to do better—for myself and for those who come after me. Not because of some false performative Christianity. But because it’s what it means to be a decent human being.
If we stripped away capitalism, what would be left?
What would we value if it wasn’t tied to our productivity or our bank accounts?
Because at the end of the day, we all have an expiration date. We can’t take wealth with us. The only thing that remains is the legacy we leave behind.
So the question is: What kind of legacy do we want to leave? One built on hate, greed, and cruelty? Or one built on love, generosity, and justice?
This is your choose-your-own-adventure moment. What path will you take?
Lenten Reflection: A Call to Justice:
Proverbs 31:8-9 – “Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves, for the rights of all who are destitute. Speak up and judge fairly; defend the rights of the poor and needy.”
Lent is about transformation. It is about letting go of selfishness and leaning into justice.
🔹 Where have I been silent when I should have spoken up?
🔹 What am I willing to sacrifice to make the world better?
🔹 Am I actively living out my values—or just speaking about them?
At the end of it all, what will truly matter?
The answer isn’t wealth. It isn’t status. It’s how we treat one another.
📖 Read my Lenten Reflections: flanneldiaries.com (link in bio).
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