The Telephone To The Rescue

Used to be, if you were going through personal problems you might visit a priest

. People with more money than faith would often see a shrink. Then in 1953, an English vicar had an epiphany. Why not create a hotline where people contemplating suicide could ring up a counselor anytime they were feeling blue? No charge.

Good Samaritans

Reverend Varah called his brainchild The Samaritans after the gospel parable about a solid citizen who renders aid to a roadside mugging victim after several religious types devoutly elected not to get involved. The English pastor had recently heard the alarming statistic that in the city of London there was an average of three suicides each day. Pastor Varah believed that this number could be significantly decreased if despondent people could reach for something other than a pistol or a bottle of pills.

Pastor Varah saw to it that they could now reach for the phone.

Varah recruited untrained church volunteers to simply listen to these unhappy callers and help shoulder their burdens. Being there for people was all he required of these 20th Century Samaritans. Having someone to talk to seemed to be exactly what these distressed souls required. 10 years later, there were 40 chapters of Samaritans in Great Britain. By 1974, the Samaritan movement had spread to the U.S. Today, you can find active chapters all along the eastern seaboard.

Suicide PreventionWest Coast Style

While Reverend Varahs compassionate little flock was busy helping unhappy Brits keep a stiff upper lip, a secular group in Los Angeles, California started a similar concept called the Los Angeles Suicide Prevention Center. Then in 1962, San Francisco Suicide launched a program, dubbed Call Bruce. Like the British innovation, Call Bruce sought to give depressed Californians a real person to talk to. Bay residents rang up Bruce and Bruce listened. It was like a healing balm from above.

24/7

Yankee ingenuity stepped up the suicide prevention game by manning phone lines, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.Soon crisis hotline numbers were plastered on billboards, bus cards and bathroom walls. Volunteers everywhere stepped up to simply listen to hurting folks offload their problems.

Although critics dismissed these fledgling efforts as misguided philanthropyfailing to reach the seriously suicidalthe evidence suggests otherwise. A 2007 study revealed that conversing with a hotline counselor not only reduced the impulse to commit suicide during the phone call, but resulted in fewer suicidal thoughts in the intervening weeks.

All kinds of trouble

Since the advent of suicide hotlines, other emergency lines have been created by special interest groups to counsel runaways, abuse victims, problem pregnancies and those wrestling with sexual identity. Many are available with 24-hour counselors. Some of these are licensed therapists. Others are just regular folks with two listening ears and one good heart. But the work they do is Gods work. Reverend Varah is sure of that.

If you would like find the suicide prevention hotline in your area call National Suicide Hotlines USA at 1-800-SUICIDE or visit them online at suicidehotlines.com.

by: Artie Megibben

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