When I was in Canada leading the priest convocation in Vancouver, British Columbia, recently, I took a picture of the "Homeless Jesus" sculpture on a park bench in front of the door of Holy Rosary Cathedral.
Notice the holes in his feet. It makes quite a statement to those going in and coming out of the cathedral for Mass.
As long as you
failed to do it for
these least
ones, you failed to do
it for
me.
MATTHEW 25
One of my favorite weekly laughs used to come from
“News From The Weird,” a column in that free paper I used to see all over
Louisville. It’s called LEO. They always had a few stories that proved “truth
is stranger than fiction.” One of their regular themes is the fact that we
human beings have a tendency to get our priorities all screwed up. Some time
back, for instance, they told of a situation in Washington, DC - a domestic
altercation which broke out between John Hardy and his wife. As they scuffled,
their pit bull became so agitated that John Hardy pulled out a knife and
fatally stabbed the dog to death. Judge
Fredrick Weisberg sentenced Mr. Hardy to three months in prison for
assaulting his wife and twenty-four months for assaulting his dog! Talk
about your priorities!
In the gospel today, we are presented with an imaginary
courtroom scene where the priority of love, active love expressed and realized
in deeds of kindness and mercy, is presented as the criteria upon which
judgment will be rendered. The only law that counts in that courtroom is the
law of unselfish love. The only question asked is “did you offer practical help
and assistance to your fellow human beings?” Jesus sits on the judges bench. We are called in, one by one, to stand before him for judgment. When the witnesses are
called, the hungry, the thirsty, the naked, the ill and strangers, they will testify to the fact that they know us or to the fact that they have
no idea who we are. It will be a biblical version of that old 60's quote that
said, “If you were accused of being a Christian, would there be enough evidence
to convict you?” In this judgment scene, Jesus is not some vindictive judge.
Our own actions, rather the lack of them in this case, will convict us.
There was a movie a few years back where this
parable was told in modern images. It was called “Defending Your Life.” It’s about a man who was killed in a car
wreck. After death he was transported to Judgment City to await trial where he
would be called to defend his life. At his trial, all the different events of
his life are shown to him on a giant TV screen, as well as how he handled them.
His defense attorney and his prosecuting attorney take turns helping him with,
or challenging, his defense. The
criterion for judgment was “what did you do to help others with all that you were
given?”
Throughout this gospel, Jesus has been arguing with
the religious authorities over the essence of religion. They believed that the essence of religion
was about celebrating rites and rituals, keeping endless rules and
judging who was worthy and who wasn’t in God’s eyes. Jesus insisted, on the
other hand, that the essence of religion was about intentionally lifting up the
poor, actively respecting the dignity of everyone, and truly trusting the
boundless goodness and mercy of God. The message of Jesus throughout this
gospel has told us that actions count more than words. Jesus was clear when he
said, “It is not those who say, "Lord, Lord," who will enter the kingdom of God,
but those who "do the will of my Father.”
This parable is normally read to promote such things
as clothing drives, food pantries for the poor, prison visits and being kind to
minorities, immigrants and strangers. All those things are good, but they do
not go deep enough. This gospel is a lot more challenging than that. It asks us
to address the causes of these conditions. It has to do, not just with handing out
charity, but lifting up the poor in a way they can help themselves. Our charity should be looked at as a
temporary solution, not a goal in itself. As a workshop that was
advertised in The Record said recently, we need to “reinvent” charitable giving. What
is really needed is the elimination of the conditions that cause a person to
need charity. It has to do with education, affordable housing, access to health care,
informed voting, immigration policies, a living wage, peace making, educational
opportunities, national budget priorities and so on. It is about recognizing the systems that
produce these problems and committing to their elimination. In my mission work
in the islands, I am determined not to make the people down there dependent on my charity, but help organizations who can help them lift themselves out of poverty.
Over the next several weeks leading up to Christmas,
giving to charity will enter its busiest time of the year. The poor will certainly need that help, but
that is not all that our parable is saying, by a long shot. It is much more
revolutionary than that. What Jesus is asking for is an elimination of the need
to do charity! That is much more complicated, much more demanding and much more
serious.
Giving to charity, even though most people I believe
do want to do good, is not always about caring for the poor. Sometimes we give
to the poor for what it does for us and that is not necessarily bad either. It gives us a feel-good high, it makes us
feel less guilty, it will insure that we are noticed and well thought of. I
remember one Thanksgiving when I was pastor of this Cathedral. It was before the
new dining room for the homeless was built. In those days, all we could do is
give out turkey sandwiches and hot coffee. Because so many street people
were addicted to alcohol and drugs, we discouraged people from giving them
cash. Instead we suggested they give their money to our “street ministry committee” who
paid for lodging, bought food and gave out warm clothes as needed, all year
long. That Thanksgiving Day we were giving out sandwiches from the
front door of the rectory as usual, when a rich man in a fancy car drove up and got out.
He told me he wanted to give everybody in line a silver dollar. It was
embarrassing for the people in line. I would rather have taken the
bag of silver dollars and bought food for the line next week and have him hand out the sandwiches. He was not mean, I
am sure. He just was not thinking as much about the ones he wanted to give the silver dollars to, but how
good he would feel when he got back into his car.
Jesus does not condemn wealth. As Margaret Thatcher
put it, “Even the Good Samaritan had to have some extra money in his pocket!”
It’s about those of us who do have, pulling the "have-nots" up, so that we can
all be winners. The best thing we can do
for the poor and hungry and the sick and the imprisoned and the stranger is to
help them not need us.
Why care about the poor, hungry, sick, imprisoned
and the stranger? The parable hits the
bulls-eye. It’s because they are Jesus in the flesh! “As long as you did
it or failed to do it, you did it or failed to do it, for me!” What’s the bottom line here? We will stand
before Jesus someday and he will have the face of all the poor, sick, hungry,
lonely and imprisoned people we failed to notice in our lifetime. Did we have our priorities straight? Are the
priorities of Jesus our priorities? Our own deeds or lack of them will judge
us. What we have done may not be as important as what we have not
done! That’s scary!
Someone said to me recently, “There
is always somebody these days with their hand out!” It went right through me! Since I am very involved in
the Caribbean missions, it irritated me more than quite a bit. After some thought, I finally
decided that there are two ways to look at it. (1) There are a lot of lazy
beggars out there who want to be carried through life or (2) There are a lot of opportunities out there to prepare oneself to meet
Jesus who said, “As long as you failed to do it to one of these least ones, you
failed to do it for me!”
Yes, we need to be wise when it comes to charity. I don’t know about you, but I would rather run the
risk of being taken advantage of once in a while, than spending the rest of my life taking care of myself, hoarding what I have, because somebody out there might take advantage of me once in a while. I would much rather be labeled a "sucker" than a"tightwad!"
