…Looking Out for Each Other is What Liverpool Does - Reflection by Dean Sue

Two things have struck me in the news this week. The first was the woman from Leicester who on being interviewed felt that Leicester was being picked on because they were going back into lock-down after a second spike with Covid 19. The second piece of news came from Rugby (which of course is not far from Leicester) and the report about what this city council is doing because of the overwhelming amount of rubbish being left in parks and public spaces.
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These two pieces of news contrasted with a banner I saw at the Albert Dock which said ‘…looking out for each other is what Liverpool does’. This contrast made me reflect on the nature of human beings. We are naturally egotistical and we look after ourselves. We have seen this in action at the start of the pandemic when people were stockpiling pasta and toilet paper. We continue to see it as people rush to beaches in the hot weather and as they leave their rubbish in parks, on the beaches and in our streets.

But Liverpool in its statement ‘looking out for each other is what Liverpool does’ is asking us to stop, to think, and to act differently. Just like Jesus asked us to ‘love our neighbour as ourselves’ we are being asked to consider others.

As I continue to reflect on ‘looking out for each other’ I am reminded of a village called, Eyam in the Derbyshire Peak District, which self-isolated itself during the Plague of 1665 to avoid spreading the disease to neighbouring villages. They sacrificed themselves for 14 months and lost most of the villagers. They are an example of looking out for each other. We in Liverpool have our own examples of people looking out for each other. Kitty Wilkinson known, as the Saint of the Slums, during the 1832 Liverpool cholera epidemic offered her boiler to others so that could wash their infected clothes.

There are many more examples of people ‘looking out for each other’ during the past few months so let us not give in to our natural instinct of looking out for ourselves. Let us take our rubbish home and, if we are asked to go into a second lock-down, let us do it graciously knowing that we are saving others by doing so.

Jesus said: ‘Love Your Neighbour as Yourself.’

Dean Sue

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