Supporting--Or Enabling?

 So many questions; so little time!

For several decades now, I've been having internal struggles about what comprises being supportive of others through tough times versus enabling them to continue to make the decisions that put them in those tough times initially.  Where is the dividing line between supporting and enabling?  This can happen in families as well as churches and national politics, and I still don't have a definitive answer.

As an example of this, I have a dear friend who is the chief cook at my church's Homeless Feeding Mission--not for the homeless of Plainfield, IN, where we all live, but for the homeless in Indianapolis.  This man is a political conservative, but he is also a Christian.  Understand that some homeless folk are simply down on their luck, but many also have untreated mental illness or alcohol/drug addictions.  Church members who go to the streets to serve them food know this but feed them anyway, against the wishes of government authorities.  The authorities think of the homeless as they think of stray dogs: if you feed them, they will stick around.  Bad for business.  Hard to deal with.  They hope that if they aren't helped with food from churches, they will seek out homeless shelters, etc.  What they fail to understand is that many shelters are faith-based.  They may require the homeless to attend church services in order to stay there.  Still others won't allow the homeless to bring their "stuff" in the shelter with them, leaving every little thing they own to be at risk for theft while they sleep on a cot for the night.  (Also, they have to be out of the shelter by 10:00 AM.  They can return the next night IF there is a bed available.  Shelters are not a home!)  Robbed of dignity or permanent help, many of the homeless prefer to stay on the streets.  This is totally against Conservative values...yet my friend considers it his Christian duty to help feed these people the one meal a week that my church provides.  So...is he supporting the homeless or enabling them to stay homeless?

I am a devoted student of Dr. Phil.  I watch every show faithfully and have learned much in the process.  He often has people on his show that are at war with their children whom they have enabled to be moochers.  They believe their adult kids would be living on the streets were it not for their support, and what kind of parents would they be to let their own bairn suffer??   Ninety-nine percent of the time, Dr. Phil is able to show the parents that they've been parenting out of guilt, compensating for some perceived failures on their part, and thus giving and giving and giving in order to make themselves feel better, without even thinking of the lessons they are teaching the kids.  He often quotes Ben Franklin's Poor Richard's Almanac, when he says, "Necessity is the mother of invention."  In other words, when adults are faced with few acceptable choices, they will find a way to be in the world.  Giving them money or a place to live won't stop their problems.  They need to figure things out for themselves.

I'm not a rich person, and that is probably merciful.  If I were, I would be enabling people all over the place.  Can't do what I can't afford, but I still struggle with the idea of helping vs. enabling.  In my family, in my church, and in the nation.  

While it kills me to only be able to "help" one person at a time, I am reminded of an interview that Oprah Winfrey had with Melinda Gates, wife of Bill Gates, with millions to give to make better lives, worldwide.  When an African mother begged Melinda to take her child so the child could have a life, Melinda said she had to turn the mother's attention to other sources for help.  Oprah asked, "How do you handle that kind of pressure?"  Mrs. Gates said, after much heartfelt reflection, "First, you have to let your heart break."

I have had to get tough with my heart to realize that I can't save the world, although I really wish I could.  I'm having to determine what is supportive and what is enabling.  I wish there were easy answers!