You know the guys I’m talking about. They’re there every year around this time. They are standing outside seemingly every single store in the world, bundled up, and ringing a bell.
To date I’ve never had one ask me for anything. Usually they just smile and greet me as I rush past them. But I know they’re there for my money. I can feel it. Why else would they have that little bucket? And for most of my life I felt very guilty as I walked by them.
That was until last year when it hit me, I have nothing to be guilty about. I give a lot of money to charities as well as to my church. Just because someone is standing there asking doesn’t mean that’s the place I have to chose to support at that time. It’s not that I don’t support what they are doing (although I do wonder if guilt-driven charity is a healthy practice), it’s just that I used to hate feeling guilty, as though I was kicking a homeless person by not dropping a few quarters in their bucket. But not any more!
So when you seen these kind people the next time you’re out shopping for bread, don’t feel guilty, just give them a smile and be on your way—that is unless you don’t give anything to anybody. In that case you’re a selfish bum, and should feel guilty. 
Filed under: Charity, Christmas, Giving, Guilt, Salvation Army
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