"[T]he test of the worth of a community is not how well the most privileged people make out, but what provision is made for the least, for those who are exceptional in their need for our kindness.”
Our Quote of the Week compels us to measure the value of a community not by economic factors but by gauging how well it can care for those with the fewest resources and defenses. In other words, we must measure the worth of our communities by our ability to be kind.
For this week’s quote, we traveled back in time almost 70 years to the beginning of Sargent Shriver’s career in public service. The year was 1957, and Sargent Shriver was chair of both the Chicago Board of Education and of the Catholic Interracial Council. He gave this speech, The Favorite Pupil, to a group of teachers of young people with developmental disabilities. He focuses on this question of caring for those in society who are “least able to take care of themselves":
“What provision does a civilization make for its least members? What advantage does it offer for those who are least able to take care of themselves?”
And he pulls examples from scripture and from history to make the point that there is nothing more valuable than nurturing those who are least capable of caring for themselves, ending the speech with:
“More than this no teacher can do.”
Sargent Shriver continued to place importance on the kindness of community throughout his career, which we can see from the way he envisioned “community action” as the central concept of the War on Poverty, to the way he dedicated himself to Special Olympics in his later years, joining his wife Eunice’s efforts to empower young people with intellectual disabilities through sports and physical fitness. Shriver always prioritized community and emphasized that the way to ensure the stability and potential of each member was to nurture a culture of kindness.
May we adopt and encourage this approach of measuring the worth of our communities in this same way: by our ability to care for our most vulnerable neighbors and our propensity for kindness.
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