Justice for... all?

I like the environment.
I hate driving.
Driving in my city makes me sin.

Ergo, I ride the bus to work every day.

On that particular evening, the bus was only about half to three-quarters full. There was the usual back-drop of chatter and murmured conversation, but nothing significant. The crowd was pretty tame that night... As we pulled up to the T-stop, from my seat near the front of the bus, I could see that there was a decent-sized crowd queued to get on the bus. So I wasn't surprised when all the seats, including the one next to mine, filled up. The aisles were also full.

I smelled my seatmate before I saw him. His best friends were named Jack and Jim (Daniels and Bean, respectively), and he had clearly spent a good deal of time with them earlier that evening. Standing at about 6'2,'' with Rastafarian-style dreads, huge overcoat, and carrying crazy yellow and orange spider flowers, my new friend loudly self-proclaimed to the bus that he was seventy-six and "having a good time."

He then proceeded to loudly announce to me, and the rest of the bus, that he was scary and he knew it, that he intended to give me nightmares. And then told me how he intended to do that. All the while, inching closer and closer, to a point where, if he had gotten any closer, he would have been sitting in my lap. Leering. Yelling. Laughing. And when I refused to respond, he proceeded to lecture the bus (ironically) on the five principles of keeping your woman happy, which would have been highly entertaining, had the situation been different. And the bus sat silently. No one responded. No one moved.

When I got off the bus, my emotions were all over the board: Angry. Terrified. Sad. Furious. Verbally abused. Fearful. Confused. Mostly, however, I was just angry. I had been treated unfairly. I didn't deserve that treatment. I didn't ask for it. It was not right. Period.

Since then, I have ridden the bus a few other times when this man, who calls himself by a wide variety of different names, has been on the bus. And I've learned a few other facts about him (via his monologues). He is a war veteran. He suffered from PTSD. He is homeless. He's mentally a few sandwiches short of a picnic, but has been dismissed from the local mental hospital. He has no family. He sleeps in Central Square. And he always monologues loudly, in similar situations to mine, and no one ever responds.

So now, I see a second layer of injustice. He was medicated early with heavy medications for a disorder which he obtained in service to his country. When the medication ceased, alcohol was the easy second coping mechanism. He sleeps on the streets, having been dismissed as "unaidable" from the mental institution. And he rides the bus because its warmer on the bus than on the streets. It's not right. Period.

So as I have been processing through this, a few thoughts have kind of spilled out for me...

1) Injustice is never one-dimensionally; it is complex, multi-layered, and similar to a spiderweb in that, if you step on the wrong twisty thread, or look for the simple solution before dealing with the complexity, you wind up in a sticky situation.

2) I am much quicker to deal with injustice when it personally affects me. I am quite willing to be apathetic when it isn't my cause of the week, or personally relevant to me. I talk the talk, but "caring" takes on an entirely different tone when it hits close to home.

3) It's ok for injustice to make you angry. In fact, it should. The question is, where does that anger take you? To bitterness, hatred, judgment, and disengagement? Or to fight for justice, to engage in healthy ways, and towards a great understanding of our fallen and broken nature as humans?

What's the right answer? I don't know. But this much I do know:

1) Running away, giving in to fear, is not the answer.
2) Being foolish and foolhearty, ignoring safety, not thinking wisely, also not the answer.
3) We, each and every one, have an intrinsic and undefinable longing for justice. Something in us screams, "I was made for something better!"

Meanwhile we groan, longing to be clothed with our heavenly dwelling, because when we are clothed, we will not be found naked. For while we are in this tent, we groan and are burdened, because we do not wish to be unclothed but to be clothed with our heavenly dwelling, so that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life. (2 Corinthians 5:2-4)