Dear Editor,

The morning was cold, clear, invigorating. The sky was blue; the students were happily communicating.

An apparently poor, rather thin, working class woman came down the lane beside the Danna Center carrying two huge plastic sacks filled with empty aluminum cans. She was clearly overburdened.

Near the entrance to Monroe library she paused, set down the sacks, stretched her muscles and back and laboriously hoisted her burden and trudged onward, past dozens of socializing students, stumbled down a brick road embellished with Loyola’s core values preaching “Social Concern for the Poor and Oppressed,” “Learning from Experience” and many other similar ideals.

She parted from ideal alley heading now down Loyola Street. In front of the business school this proletarian entrepreneur paused once again, lowered her burden, rested for a moment, picked up her meager monetary resource and disappeared — still alone — into the byways of the university district.

As was the case in the Bible parable, the priest saw her and passed by, but in this case no Samaritan came to her aid.

Sincerely,
Leo A. Nicoll, S.J.
associate history professor
[email protected]