In Denmark, there are libraries where you can borrow a person instead of a book to listen to their life story for 30 minutes. The aim is to fight against prejudices. Each person has a title – “unemployed”, “refugee”, “bipolar”, etc. – but by listening to their story, you realize how much you shouldn’t “judge a book by its cover”. This innovative and brilliant project is active in more than 50 countries. It’s called “The Human Library”.
When I heard of THE HUMAN LIBRARY one of the first thoughts that came to my mind was, “I WANT TO GO THERE” quickly followed by “I WANT TO START ONE” and as I let those two thoughts dance wildly with each other, another tune began to play, a much slower, sweeter melody, familiar but still unheard:
WE LIVE DAILY IN
THE HUMAN LIBRARY
I can’t remember the last time I have lived a day without some kind of human interaction; as a hospice chaplain, a minister, a husband, a dad, a grandfather, a brother, an uncle, an in-law and as a frequent visitor to STARBUCKS, I have had countless encounters with so many people on any given day, and that’s just IN PERSON, not counting the texting, emailing, and messaging I do throughout the day; The question, isn’t WHEN HAVE I EVER BEEN TO THE HUMAN LIBRARY so much as WHEN HAVE I EVER BEEN ABSENT FROM THE HUMAN LIBRARY. . .
The biggest questions are:
AM I MAKING USE OF IT. . .
AM I LITERALLY BORROWING AS WELL AS GIVING. . .
AM I DOING MORE LISTENING/LEARNING. . .
AM I DOING MORE TALKING/TEACHING. . .
AM I DRIVING IDLY PAST THE HUMAN LIBRARY. . .
AM I PULLING INTO THE PARKING LOT OFTEN
(EARLY AND STAYING LATE). . .
THE HUMAN LIBRARY
. . .now that’s a Levy we can all get behind and vote
. . .S U P P O R T
WILL YOU
. . .This is one Library
where you don’t have to be
Q U I E T
JOIN ME
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