Solidarity, Judgment, Hospitality.
November 3: Romans 12, 8 - 10 + Luke 14, 25-33
November 4: Romans 14, 7-12 + Luke 15, 1-10
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Hard sayings on discipleship and solidarity today from Jesus. Take up your own cross! These
words are dulled by 2,000 years of Christian tradition. We think of the cross as an object of piety.
Few of us would mind picking up a sterling silver or 24 karat gold cross and hanging it about our
necks, with a nice, safe, Jesus affixed thereupon. For Jesus' first hearers, and for those who were
the first readers of Luke's Gospel, however, such words must have been almost
incomprehensible. Imagine: Go up to your electric chair and sit upon it.
As if this isn't enough, today's passage ends with, "Whoever does not renounce all his
possessions cannot be My disciple." Thanks Jesus, we really needed that.
But we do need that kind of hard saying. We can't imagine life without our comforts; here in the
affluent west, things we consider to be absolute necessities are incredible luxuries in the third
world. And we finance our luxures by our ruthlessness, our merciless foreign military and
economic policies, interest payments stolen from the rice bowls of the poor, contractors for Nike
and Adidas and Disney who steal the childhoods of poor children in order to create products to
sell in the wealthy west. Children go hungry in foreign lands so we can have fresh tomatoes and
lettuce in January. Should we not in some cases interpret these words of Jesus quite literally? If
we don't abandon our houses, shouldn't we renounce any of our possessions that are stolen from
the poor?
The gospel for November 4th continue's Luke's theme of Jesus' hospitality to sinners and those
who are marginalized by presenting two parables -- the lost sheep, and the lost coin. Here is a
modern reading of this passage:
"The crack addicts, homeless, and prostitutes were all drawing near to listen to him, but the
politicians and respectable people began to complain, saying, 'this man welcomes the underclass
and fellowships with them.'"
The readings in Romans are part of the passage where Paul discusses the "division of labor"
within the Body of Christ. He calls Christians to love one another with sincerity and "mutual
affection." Paul returns to an earlier theme, and calls the Romans to not "look down" upon
others, and says that all will give an account to God for their actions.
The United States is allegedly a "classless society," but this is another of those national delusions
that gets us in trouble. Many people despise people who are poor, they tell lies and slanders about
them with abandon. I live in a neighborhood that is on the boundary between the very poor and
the middle class. The stories I hear from people who don't live in my neighborhood. "You live
THERE!" When I worked for an African American parish in Northeast Oklahoma City, people
told me, "I'd be afraid to go over there." Politicians inflame these misperceptions and fears, and
people don't bother to question the assumptions: "Of course it's a bad neighborhood, there are
poor people there! How could it be anything else?"
November 3rd is the celeration of St. Martin de Porres, in the Catholic tradition one of the patrons
of social justice, one of the "Holy Helpers of the Poor." He was born in Lima, Peru in the 16th
century, the son of a Spaniard man and an African woman. His father refused to acknowledge
him until he was 8 years old. He was apprenticed as a barber-surgeon, and became a Dominican
lay brother. He was famed for his hospitality to the poor -- and also to animals, he often fed the
stray and abandoned cats and dogs that he found in the streets. For this reason, he is often
portrayed in religious art with a little cat and dog beside him. He lived a long time ago, in a
culture different from ours today, but his heroic virtues and witness of Gospel solidarity remain
important to us today. St. Martin de Porres did not think that the people who lived in the poor
part of town should be shunned, rather, they should be loved, embraced, and comforted. May his
example be before us today, and may his intercession on behalf of the poor and marginalized be
powerful!
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