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A spiritual comment and prayer to begin the day with Rev Dr Alfred Banya, Head of Chaplaincy at King's College Hospital in London

Kindness

Good morning.

Sometime we overlook situations where a gesture of kindness could make a difference.

Moving to a new country can be traumatic. I vividly recall when I first arrived in the UK many years ago how my expectations were dashed, but a gesture of kindness made such a difference. Before I left my home country, I thought I was competent in English, but my accent became a big source of amusement when I ended up in a college deep in the English countryside.

Another thing was pop music culture which was alien to me. When I was shown a poster of David Bowie and I said didn鈥檛 know who he was, this was major cause of laughter and ridicule. One of the teachers was more interested in whether I could run the 100 metres than in my ambition to pass exams and go to University.

I was lost, and felt so alone. I wanted to return to my home country. In fact, I wrote a letter home to that effect, but decided not to post it.

Surprisingly, as the weeks went by, one of the students kindly reached out to me, a gesture of kindness that I really needed at that time. After my exams, I had nowhere to live. His family took me in until I found a place and later started my undergraduate studies. A lesson for me was that kindness indeed matters.

So Lord, give us strength today to show kindness in all that we do. Help us open our arms to those less fortunate and to extend our hands to those in need of our support.

Amen

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