Accompanying Mother Teresa, as we did, to these different activities for the purpose of filming them—to the Home for the Dying, to the lepers and unwanted children, I found I went through three phases. The first was horror mixed with pity, the second compassion pure and simple, and the third, reaching far beyond compassion, something I had never experienced before—an awareness that these dying and derelict men and women, these lepers with stumps instead of hands, these unwanted children, were not pitiable, repulsive or forlorn, but rather dear and delightful; as it might be, friends of long standing, brothers and sisters. How is it to be explained—the very heart and mystery of the Christian faith? To soothe those battered old heads, to grasp those poor stumps, to take in one’s arms those children consigned to dustbins, because it is [Christ’s] head, as they are his stumps and his children, of whom he said that whosoever received one such child in his name received him.
—Malcolm Muggeridge, Something Beautiful for God
Excellent testimony, T! You clearly get it.
It was interesting after I had been playing at Children’s Hospital for several years how my attitude changed. I didn’t go to entertain, or to do the “right” thing anymore. I went to meet people and share life with them. No matter how sick or disabled or deformed, as I looked into a child’s face I saw a human being. And after playing for and talking a little with him/her, it was obvious the arts are for everyone, no matter what their condition; and maybe even more so for those who are lacking in some other way in their life. They were all created by God the Father just like I was.