The Journey 139
Read: Luke 15: 11-31
It is the dream of every parent and also children to graduate with a degree that gives them a good job, a decent pay to sustain them for a life time. But today one of the greatest problem that the family and the young people face, is the growing debt that they have accumulated to do their studies. According to the news reports on an average every college student who graduated in 2011 has a debt of about $25,250, while another 10% owes more than $54,000. This is basically because drastic cut in federal aid resulting into the colleges raising their tuition fees and other expenses to almost 25% in the last three years. Along with the growing student debt, is the issue where most of the students are not able get a good job along the lines of their education. Hence most of them get into jobs that are very poorly paid, or do not find jobs that are suitable to them. Thus we have a strange situation in this country where you not only have unemployed graduates but also underemployed graduates. Because of this the chances of paying back the student loans gets harder for the students and the family causing a huge stress in the individuals. According to a well known economist, the chances are such that some of the students of today will still be repaying loans, by the time their kids starts college. What a strange irony. A student who graduates from college is supposed to contribute creatively to the society and to the family, but today the contributions the student does is more on the level of stress and dysfunctioning, because of the pain that each of the student carries over his/her head with regards to the student loan debts. In such a context how can we think about the transformation that can happen in community? This week we are meditating on the theme “ Transformation in my community”. The biblical portion that we are meditating is from Luke 15: 11-31. Here is a story of young man who wants to make a mark in his life. I would also picture this man who suddenly is in huge debt. He had taken all the money that he could arrange from his dad and moved out of his home to make a living. But soon he realized that his financial resources dwindles to almost zero. That is when is sits and broods over his sinful and pitiable condition. He realized that he is huge debt not only financially but also in terms of ethics and morality. He came to the wide world, to make a mark for himself, without taking his dad into consideration. He goes outside the sanctity of his home to feel the joy of being independent. He does not think as to how much his father might have struggled to come to that financial security, where his contribution had been almost minimal. But now he has no problem in asking the share and also spending the share in a foolish way. But when he comes to the senses he realized the value of hard earned money, the money that his father had made, the value of relationship in the context of family, the value that things in life don't come easy and that you need to struggle and hence one needs to be wise when we think of planning our future and also the way we spend our money. I think the young son teaches all of us this wonderful aspect of examining our lives, our motives and whether we are wise when it comes to financial accountability with respects to many of our needs in life. I think we all need to sit together as a family to chalk out what is the best way so that we could be wise in terms of spending the hard earned money for the future of our education. Otherwise as the reports suggest the stress of the student loan debts could be transferred for generations bringing total chaos not only to the individuals but to the family and society as a whole? How do you think can you lessen the burden of loans that you have?
It is the dream of every parent and also children to graduate with a degree that gives them a good job, a decent pay to sustain them for a life time. But today one of the greatest problem that the family and the young people face, is the growing debt that they have accumulated to do their studies. According to the news reports on an average every college student who graduated in 2011 has a debt of about $25,250, while another 10% owes more than $54,000. This is basically because drastic cut in federal aid resulting into the colleges raising their tuition fees and other expenses to almost 25% in the last three years. Along with the growing student debt, is the issue where most of the students are not able get a good job along the lines of their education. Hence most of them get into jobs that are very poorly paid, or do not find jobs that are suitable to them. Thus we have a strange situation in this country where you not only have unemployed graduates but also underemployed graduates. Because of this the chances of paying back the student loans gets harder for the students and the family causing a huge stress in the individuals. According to a well known economist, the chances are such that some of the students of today will still be repaying loans, by the time their kids starts college. What a strange irony. A student who graduates from college is supposed to contribute creatively to the society and to the family, but today the contributions the student does is more on the level of stress and dysfunctioning, because of the pain that each of the student carries over his/her head with regards to the student loan debts. In such a context how can we think about the transformation that can happen in community? This week we are meditating on the theme “ Transformation in my community”. The biblical portion that we are meditating is from Luke 15: 11-31. Here is a story of young man who wants to make a mark in his life. I would also picture this man who suddenly is in huge debt. He had taken all the money that he could arrange from his dad and moved out of his home to make a living. But soon he realized that his financial resources dwindles to almost zero. That is when is sits and broods over his sinful and pitiable condition. He realized that he is huge debt not only financially but also in terms of ethics and morality. He came to the wide world, to make a mark for himself, without taking his dad into consideration. He goes outside the sanctity of his home to feel the joy of being independent. He does not think as to how much his father might have struggled to come to that financial security, where his contribution had been almost minimal. But now he has no problem in asking the share and also spending the share in a foolish way. But when he comes to the senses he realized the value of hard earned money, the money that his father had made, the value of relationship in the context of family, the value that things in life don't come easy and that you need to struggle and hence one needs to be wise when we think of planning our future and also the way we spend our money. I think the young son teaches all of us this wonderful aspect of examining our lives, our motives and whether we are wise when it comes to financial accountability with respects to many of our needs in life. I think we all need to sit together as a family to chalk out what is the best way so that we could be wise in terms of spending the hard earned money for the future of our education. Otherwise as the reports suggest the stress of the student loan debts could be transferred for generations bringing total chaos not only to the individuals but to the family and society as a whole? How do you think can you lessen the burden of loans that you have?