R.I.P Medical Debt

Recently I met with small group and discussed a big problem – Medical Debt.

The meeting was inspired by reading an article where churches came together to leverage their money to buy debt., like collection agencies do….. the medical debt of complete strangers…. like six million dollars worth……. and then, forgive it. What an audacious idea!

The idea was so big, so inspiring, so Christ like, that I could not let it go. So, the six of us sat, hearing the story of a son who died at age 34 and, had he lived, would have had nearly $750,0000 in debt for a two day hospital stay. We heard other personal stories of debt not so large but heavy enough a burden that it would have sank many families in this country. We knew the statistic, 61% of all bankruptcies are due to medical debt. We knew that a plan like Medicare For All would be a solution, and we knew that M4A is more unicorn than horse. We also knew that we could not sit idle.

That evening we made a pact that we would be the core of an action that would raise enough funds to buy six million dollars in medical debt. We had no idea how but the pledge was in place.

I am one who firmly believes that is an idea is big enough and bold enough that it will spark the imagination and stir the soul of others. The pact was the first step. There is power in setting a goal and in saying it aloud. There is even more power in writing it down and keeping it in front of you. In this short scrit I both say it to you, dear reader, and write it for myself.

Henry David Thoreau wrote, “I learned this, at least, by my experiment: that if one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life which he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours. He will put some things behind, will pass an invisible boundary; new, universal, and more liberal laws will begin to establish themselves around and within him; or the old laws be expanded, and interpreted in his favor in a more liberal sense, and he will live with the license of a higher order of beings. …………..If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost; that is where they should be. Now put the foundations under them.”

I am off to lay some foundation.