Charity Begins at Home But…

“Charity begins at home” is a well-worn phrase – the term “charity” commonly defined as generosity, helpfulness, mercy, goodwill, kindness and compassion extended to others.

It’s origin is somewhat hazy, but one possibility is the English satirist John Marston’s play Histrio-Mastix (1610) which contains the line “True charity beginneth first at home”. Certainly, the phrase has been used, misused and abused throughout the centuries.

There are any number of ways that charity can be practiced. For example:

We help ourselves and our own first, second and last.
We preach the virtue of charity for all, but those closest to us are neglected, disrespected and mistreated.
We practice charity at home and seek ways to extend the gift of charity to others.

Personally, I subscribe to the third path as illustrated in the following two stories.

Extending the Gift

“Charity begins at home but should not end there.” Thomas Fuller

Welcome to Our Home

Paulo and Juan’s home is a soft place to land for family, friends and newcomers to their circle. While they are not wealthy, they enjoy sharing what they have. Their generosity and open-heartedness is typified by the table that they lay, which features simple yet satisfying food and drink lovingly prepared and served. If you are invited or even happen to stop by their place at mealtimes it matters not. You are welcome to sit at their table and partake of what they have. And the conversation is not bad either.

An Example to Live By and Build upon

Janine and Leona grew up in a loving home where they felt safe and protected and where their most important needs were met. Their parents were not perfect but Janine and Leona knew that they were loved and wanted and for them that was huge. Generosity, forgiveness and acceptance were a big part of their family’s values and those qualities were expressed in small and large ways within the family as well as with other family members, friends and the larger community. When Janine and Leona left home to begin independent lives of their own, they consciously decided to carry their family of origin values into the new lives that they were creating for themselves. The results? Generosity begets generosity. Love begets love. Forgiveness and acceptance beget those qualities too.

The Highest Form of Charity

When the negative gives birth to the positive

While good things – behaviors, attitudes, values – begin at home, so can bad things.

Often the disappointments and harms experienced in the home that was meant to nurture and care for us generates more of the same negativity in our adult relationships.

It does not have to be that way.

You see, once we are adults, we are responsible for ourselves and our actions legally, morally and spiritually. Thus the onus is on us to seek help to heal the wounds of the past and to gift ourselves with the love, kindness and generosity that we were deprived of when we were young.

In my view, this is the highest form of charity that we can practice.

If others before us have overcome the deficiencies of the past, we can too. And, importantly, when we treat ourselves in charitable ways, past hurts will no longer dominate us and we will thus be less likely to repeat them.

It is then that a new family story, marked by gentleness and kindness, begins. And it begins with us.