Privacy

[Aussies]

I may be out of line with this one but it is only due to caring about others that I raise the matter. When we have things occur in our lives, either personal or on a larger scale, such as the floods in NZ at the present time or the fires or storms or earth quakes that currently plague our planet. If we and ours, have been placed in a position where others would be concerned about us, or we ourselves need the love consideration and prayers of others, it seems wrong that privacy concerns could slow down a heart felt loving response from others. As an example, if the situation occurred that left my family in a state of hurt, then at least to my mind that is when we would need the love and support of others, right then, not a week or two later when we have somehow managed to regain our composure.
I understand that in the world in which we find ourselves "privacy" is a big issue and the privacy of others needs to be respected.
However a spontaneous heart felt expression can be of great assistance when we need it.
I would like to seek your thoughts on the matter and if enough hold a similar concern and feel that it would be appropriate, could our personal profile allow for a box to tick or something that would show that in such a situation we would welcome the prayers and hearts of others over our personal privacy. As I understand it at the present time we would need to be asked for our permission to allow others to know what is going on in our personal lives and if the situation is severe, we may not be able to reply to that request for some time. So is it possible to bypass privacy concerns in such a situation. That does not mean that we lose the right to our personal privacy but rather in extreme situations others can feel free to both support us and allow others to know of the situation so that they to can offer the same support. Its great to be loved by others but sometimes we just need to see that love in action immediately.
What do you think?

 

[FollowingHim]

I think if there is such a situation, it would be appropriate to share the relevant information with trusted people by private message or email, asking for their prayers. It would not be appropriate to share it on the open internet without permission.

I cannot see such a general permission checkbox being useful, because none of us can foresee the details of what situations may arise in our lives. We might think today that it would be ok for others to bypass privacy concerns if we ran into a future hypothetical situation - but when such a situation actually arises, it may be something we don't actually want shared. So something could end up being shared by someone else thinking we would want that, when actually we would not.

There is no need to share such information publicly on the internet in order for someone to receive prayer support. We have an innumerable array of options for how to talk to each other privately, both on this forum and otherwise. I would strongly encourage people to use this forum as a way to make real-world contacts with each other, and not consider this forum to be the only way to communicate.