Eldad and Medad,
Prophets Among the People

September 27, 2009, Twenty-sixth Sunday in Ordinary Time
Numbers 11:25-29 James 5:1-6 Mark 9:38-40

To the churched and unchurched[1]
gathered in a temple not built by human hands[2]

First Reading

The LORD came down in the cloud and spoke to Moses. Taking some of the spirit that was on Moses, the LORD bestowed it on the seventy elders; and as the spirit came to rest on them, they began to speak out like prophets.
Now two of the seventy elders, Eldad and Medad, stayed back in the camp. Though they had not gone to the Tent, the spirit came down on them anyway, and they began to speak out in the camp like prophets. Then Joshua, son of Nun, who from his youth had been Moses’ aide, said, “My lord, Moses, I beseech you to stop them." Moses answered him, "Are you trying to protect my position of authority in the community? Would that all God’s people were prophets, and would that He would give his Spirit to all of them!"

The word of the Lord
Thanks be to God
-----------------
Alleluia, alleluia.
A reading from the holy Gospel according to Mark
Glory to you, Lord.

At that time, John said to Jesus, "Teacher, we saw someone driving out demons in your name, and we tried to stop him, for he isn’t one of our group." Jesus replied, "Do not stop him: no one who works a miracle in my name is likely to speak evil of me. Anyone who is not against us is for us.”

The Gospel of the Lord.
Praise to you, Lord Jesus Christ.

Introduction
September

Here it is the Twenty-sixth Sunday of Ordinary Time and the last Sunday of September. The last leaves of brown are tumbling down on a glorious autumn day.

The problem of “official” and “unofficial”

The writers of Scripture are usually addressing problems in their communities. Rarely do they sit down on a glorious autumn day with no problems running through their heads and write Scripture. There’s a problem reflected in the first and third reading today: a religious institution tends to restrict God's action to the institution's action. It tends to make a distinction between what’s “official” and what’s “unofficial,” and then keep the “unofficial” in its place.
That problem is alive and well in the first reading today. Joshua tells Moses to stop Eldad and Medad from prophesying, for they had stayed back in the camp and had not gone to the Tent; so they were unofficial prophets. Moses, expressing the spirit of a good religious leader, tells Joshua that he will not stop them from prophesying. In fact, Moses wishes that God would give his Spirit to all His people and make prophets out of them all.

The problem of the official and the unofficial is alive and well also in the gospel reading. John tells Jesus that he and the disciples saw a man not belonging to their group (and therefore unofficial) casting out demons in His name, and that they tried to stop him. (Mk 9:38) Like Moses Jesus expresses the same spirit of a good religious leader. He refuses to stop the man, for whoever is not against them, Jesus says, is for them. (Mk 9:40)

Stopping Gumbleton

When one day the people were trying to bring their little ones to Jesus, and the disciples were holding them off, the Lord said to the disciples, “Stop stopping the little children from coming to Me, for the Kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these.” (Mt 19:13-14) The Lord also says, “Stop stopping unofficial people from coming to Me, for the Kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these.”

Stop stopping Bishop Thomas J. Gumbleton, formerly Auxiliary Bishop of Detroit, founding president of Pax Christi USA and president of Bread for the World. The bishop made himself a very unofficial prophet (not one of the group) when he wrote a letter to America magazine, November 20, 1963, saying, "I can vouch for the fact that very many bishops share the same conviction (that not every contraceptive act is intrinsically evil). However, sadly enough, fewer and fewer are willing to say this publicly.” He made himself even more of an unofficial prophet when he predicted that, “Priestesses will inevitably come. Already female parochial administrators are proving their competency and laying the groundwork for the ordination of women.”

The Cathedral of St. John the Evangelist in Milwaukee tried to stop Gumbleton from prophesying. He was scheduled to give a lecture in the atrium attached to the cathedral. The lecture was being sponsored by Call to Action-–a lay movement labeled by some as definitely unofficial and even as “dissident.” The rector of the cathedral notified Call to Action that the scheduled lecture could not be held on cathedral premises. As one door closed, another opened. All Saints Catholic Church in Milwaukee opened its doors and gave this unofficial prophet a hearty welcome with resounding gospel music at Mass.

Stopping Fr. Hans Küng

Fr. Hans Küng, a Swiss German Catholic theologian, also made himself a very unofficial prophet (not one of the group). The institution also stopped him from prophesying, when Pope John Paul II revoked his right to teach Catholic theology. Fr. Küng’s prophetic voice resounds in a little volume entitled Why I Remain a Christian (a remarkably small book considering his well-known German thoroughness). In it he writes,

I cannot believe that he, who warned the Pharisees against laying intolerable
burdens on people’s shoulders, would today declare all artificial contraception
to be mortal sin.
I cannot believe that he, who particularly invited
failures to his table, would forbid all remarried divorced people ever to
approach that table.
I cannot believe that he, who said `I have
compassion on the crowd,’ would have increasingly deprived congregations of
their pastors and allowed a system of pastoral care built up over a period of a
thousand years to collapse.

In his last “I cannot believe” Küng is referring to the present acute crisis of priest-shortage afflicting the church and our band-aid methods to solve it, like creating a consortium of parishes with a strange name like The Church of the Three Holy Women (i.e., St. Rita, St. Hedwig and Holy Rosary), or like importing foreign priests whose poor English the faithful can’t understand. Some prefer not to call it an acute crisis but rather a blessed opportunity challenging us to hear the voice of Jesus commanding us to stop stopping married men, and let them come to Him. Yes, even, to stop stopping women, and let them also come to Him.

A woman who couldn’t be stopped

Many years ago we buried Mamie Schlaefer in St. Matthew’s Church in Campbellsport, Wisconsin. She was the mother of a Capuchin priest (Fr. Austin) and the mother also of a Capuchin bishop (Bp. Salvator) and the mother even of an Agnesian nun (Sr. Cecilia). Present at the funeral Mass were about 60 Capuchins, 40 Agnesian nuns and a church full of relatives and friends. At the Liturgy of the Word the superior of the Agnesian Order, the Father Provincial of the Capuchin Order, the Bishop of Bluefields, Nicaragua and the pastor of the parish all gave speeches, some rather lengthy, in praise of Mamie Schlaefer.

At the very end of a lengthy Mass celebrated by the bishop, a woman from the pews cried out, "Bishop, Bishop, I want to say something." No answer or recognition. Again she cried out, "Bishop, Bishop, I know I'm not on the official list of speakers, but I do want to say something. I'll just come right up there and say it." Down the aisle she goes, and up the sanctuary she comes. In that little conservative country parish where everything was programmed, you could feel a tension in the air crying out, "Is there no one to stop this Eldad and Medad who’s not on the official list of speakers? Will someone please stop her, for she could go on and on, and we’ve already been at it too long?" No one stopped her. Up she goes to the mike and delivers her piece in praise of Mamie Schlaefer. She related how she had come to Campbellsport many years before, how she had a nervous breakdown, and how Mamie had frequently expressed concern and care for her, and how all that had helped to heal her. Well, she didn't go on and on, as we all thought she would. She neatly exercised her baptismal prophetic office and then stepped down.
At that funeral liturgy the head of the Agnesian Order, the head of the Capuchin Order, the Bishop of Bluefields and the pastor of the parish gave rather lengthy speeches in praise of Mamie Schlaefer, and there was silence. Up came this woman who, though she wasn’t on the official list, spoke her piece, and at that the whole congregation burst into a resounding applause!

Eldad and Medad Sunday October 1, 2006

The scripture readings for Mass are arranged according to a three-year-cycle of A, B and C. So on Sunday, October 1, 2006 (cycle B), the first reading was about Eldad and Medad, and my homily that day had much the same tone as this one has. The reader and Eucharistic minister for that Mass was someone I had never seen before. He was finely attired, read well, and was obviously a professional. At the end of Mass at the front of the church, he asked who I was. I gave him my name which he ominously wrote down on a scrap of paper. The gesture gave me momentary pause, but then I dismissed it.

On that same day of October 1, the gentleman sent a letter to the pastor of the church with carbon copies to the Archbishop and me. The letter to the pastor begins:

Dear Father,
You may be assured that any sort of letter(s) from me will be
few and far between. With your multi-parish management commitment, time must be
of the essence! May I begin by saying that the new 3-part team of yourself, your
assistant and the bishop [resident auxiliary bishop] has been very effective,
and has put the Catholic faithful who attend Old St. Mary’s Parish into an
enviable position; we are continually enlightened and inspired by all three of
you.

After that magnanimous captatio benevolentiae,[3] the gentleman expressed to the pastor his great dismay at the tone and tenor of my homily. The letter concludes:

I would suggest that if this priest were permitted to continue to serve at your
church on a regular basis, and if his message would continue to be so far
from the official teachings of the Magisterium of the Catholic Church, that
I for one would be tempted to simply depart from any Mass that is
overshadowed by his presence.
Sincerely
cc: to the Archbishop and the priest in question

Conclusion

A new lap in my journey

As I look back now, I see that that Sunday of October 1, 2006 proved to be the last of a number of nails pounded into my coffin: soon after that, I was dismissed! But it also proved to be a blessing: it eventually moved me to retreat to a safer temple not built by human hands[4], and it moved me to turn pulpit-homilies into e-mail-homilies which fly unencumbered into cyberspace. So the Twenty-sixth Sunday in Ordinary Time with its prophets Eldad and Medad holds a firm grip on aging memory, but it also holds a cherished spot in my heart, as it opens a new(and last) lap in my journey.

[1] By the “the unchurched” is especially meant not those who have left the church but those whom the church institution has left!

[2] Acts of the Apostles 17:24

[3] A stroke to engender a good feeling

[4] Act of the Apostles 17:24

(1950–2008)
The Gift We Receive and Give

September 20, 2009, Twenty-fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time
Wisdom 2:12, 17-20 James 3:16-4:3 Mark 9:30-37

To the churched and unchurched[1]
gathered in a church not built by human hands[2]

Alleluia, alleluia.
A reading from the holy Gospel according to Mark
Glory to you, Lord.

Jesus and his disciples left from there and began a journey through Galilee, but he did not wish anyone to know about it. He was teaching his disciples and telling them, “The Son of Man is to be handed over to men and they will kill Him, and three days after his death the Son of Man will rise.” But they did not understand the saying, and they were afraid to question Him.
They came to Capernaum and, once inside the house, he began to ask them, “What were you arguing about on the way?” But they remained silent. They had been discussing among themselves on the way who among them was the greatest. Then Jesus sat down, called the Twelve, and said to them, “Whoever wishes to be first must place himself last and be the servant of the others.”

Then taking a child, He placed it in the their midst, and putting his arms around it said to them, “Whoever receives one child such as this in my name, receives Me; and whoever receives Me, receives not Me but the One who sent Me.”

The Gospel of the Lord.
Praise to you, Lord Jesus Christ.

----------------
Introduction
First Day of Fall

In northern climes gold and red leaves cover the ground now, and they rustle as we shuffle our feet through them. It’s a pleasant sight and good feeling, though it is accompanied with a bit of melancholy. There are even pumpkins now in supermarkets to be carved into ghoulish faces for Halloween, or, better yet, to be baked into pies for Thanksgiving Day. This coming Tuesday, September 22, the season will change from summer into fall.

Childish adults

What doesn’t change is human nature. Journeying through Galilee, Jesus’ disciples were quarreling among themselves. When they got to Capernaum, Jesus asked what they were quarreling about. “They fell silent,” Scripture says; they were ashamed to tell Him. These full-grown men were arguing about who among them was the greatest. Jesus scolds these childish adults and tries to put them straight about true greatness: ”Whoever wishes to be first among you must place himself last of all and be the servant of the others.” (Mk 9:34-35)

The mentality of competition and prestige, which characterized the society of the Roman Empire, was already creeping into the little society of Jesus. Look at the contrast: Jesus, who is the Suffering Servant of Isaiah (Is 52& 53), has as his followers a group of men who are arguing about who among them is the greatest!

Jesus does not succeed in straightening them out. In the very next chapter of Mark, they’re still acting like kids. James and John, the sons of Zebedee, come up to Jesus and make a request: “Master, when you come into your kingdom, we want you to grant us seats of honor, one at your right and the other at your left.” Jesus tries again to put them straight with the selfsame injunction: “Whoever wishes to be great, must be the servant of the others.” (Mk 10:35-43)
Such displays of childishness are sprinkled throughout the gospels. Scribes and Pharisees, full-grown men, are depicted as prancing around with long flowing prayer-shawls, or as seeking places of honor at wedding banquets, or as looking for prominent pews in the synagogue. (Mt 23:5-6; Lk 14:7-14)

Self-esteem

Strange to say, such displays betray a note of poor self-esteem. People who don’t feel good about themselves sometimes protest in one way or the other that they’re greater than the other guy. When they do feel good about themselves, then they simply go their peaceful way. People who don’t feel good about themselves need to sit in a place of honor at a wedding banquet or in a prominent pew in church. When they do feel good about themselves, then any place will be just fine. People who don’t feel good about ourselves need to lengthen the tassels on their prayer-shawls (or do something outlandish like dropping their drawers so that their rear-ends are sticking out) in order to draw attention to themselves. When they do feel good about themselves, then they’re content, in fact even happy, to go unnoticed.

I’m not OK

The blessing of good self-esteem is bestowed at an early age, just as the wound of poor self-esteem is inflicted early on in life. By the age of three or four the matter is basically signed, sealed and delivered. By that time a recording has been set into play within us saying either "I'm OK” or “I’m not OK.” If the recording is saying “I’m OK,” we’ve been blessed, and there’s nothing more we have to do but simply live life with a grateful heart. If the recording is saying “I’m not OK,” (which in varying degrees is the case with most of us), then we have a problem to deal with.

I am one of those guys who like many others have that problem to deal with. I was born of Italian immigrants who came to this country at the start of the last century. In the beginning it’s always hard for immigrants. It was particularly hard for our family. Our mother was taken from us when we were quite young, leaving my sister and me without loving arms to cradle us. It left our father without a helpmate in a foreign land and our house without a soul. That poor start has set off an “I’m-not-OK” recording in my life, which always needs opposite voices telling me “I’m OK.”

I’m OK

Over the years friends have affirmed me as OK, and even more than just OK. My task has been to heed and believe them. Their voices did not succeed in turning off the not-OK-recording inside me, but they did, indeed, succeed in turning down its volume, enabling me to live a productive life.

Besides good friends there was also my dog, Simeon. For fourteen years he affirmed me as OK, and even more than just OK. He didn’t turn off the not-OK-recording inside me, but he did, indeed, turn down its volume. I recall a little pillow a friend had given me a long time ago. On it was inscribed: “My goal in life is to be the kind of person my dog thinks I am.” There’s no better pill for one who doesn’t feel good about himself than having a dog. No wonder there are so many passionate dog-lovers in the world.

Jesus confirms what good friends and our dogs keep telling us. “Two sparrows are sold for one penny in the marketplace,” He tells us, “and yet not one of those tiny creatures falls to the ground without your Father’s consent. So don’t be afraid. Know that you are worth more than a whole flock of sparrows.” (Mt 10:29-30)

Russert’s gift to Luke

Good self-esteem is a critical gift. Because of bad self-esteem kids commit suicide or avenge themselves with school massacres or fix themselves up with fast-fixes or wear their pants below their knees. At the end of the day, good self-esteem isn’t the result of giving kids the toys and trinkets of technology; it’s the result of giving them something very special and very spiritual.

Tim Russert gave his son Luke (the only child of Russert and his wife) something very special and spiritual. American television journalist and moderator of NBC's Meet the Press for 16 years he authored two books: Wisdom of Our Fathers and Big Russ and Me. The second became a no. 1 New York Times best seller. In it he tells about the dreaded day he had to drop his son Luke off at college. As they were parting he handed his son a note and told him to, “Read it after I leave.” Russert left and Luke read the note:

Dear Luke, off you go. New school, new city, new friends, new challenges. You
are more than ready. Whether it was New York or Washington or the different
schools you've been to, you've connected with people that made your mark. I've
so enjoyed watching you and helping you grow. We've had an amazing 19 years
together. I hope we have at least another 19. I will always be here for you. We
are bonded by blood. Call any time, any day, with good news or bad. I am on your
side. Keep an open mind to new ideas and people with different views. Study
hard. Laugh often. Keep your honor. With admiration, respect, and deep love,
dad, a.k.a. The Big Guy.

Son Luke told Today’s Matt Lauer, “I spoke to him [his dad] at least two to three times a day. It had to do with the election coming up, sports, or just about life. There was always a lot of love from him. We would always hug. There wasn’t a day that went by that I didn’t know my father loved me. For that, I’m eternally grateful.”

Conclusion
Self-esteem: the gift we receive and bestow

Good self-esteem is a gift we receive, and we are deeply grateful to friends and our dogs who help us to feel good about ourselves. Good self-esteem is also a gift we bestow, as Russert bestowed it on son Luke. Without good self-esteem we have nothing, and with it we have everything, even though we might have nothing.

[1] By the “the unchurched” is especially meant not those who have left the church but those whom the church institution has left!

[2] Acts of the Apostles 17:24

Works or faith?
Strange News but Good News

September 13, 2009, Twenty-fourth Sunday in Ordinary Time
Isaiah 50:5-9 James 2:14-18 Mark 8:27-35

To the churched and unchurched[1]
gathered in a church not built by human hands[2]

Second reading from James

My dear brothers and sisters, what good is it to claim to have faith, if you don’t have good works? Can that kind of faith save anyone? If a brother has nothing to wear and has no food for the day, and you say to him, “Go in peace, keep warm, and eat heartily,” and then don’t give him clothes and food, what good is that? In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead. But someone will say, “You have faith; I have deeds.” Show me your faith without deeds, and I will show you my faith by what I do.

The word of the Lord
Thanks be to God
-----------------

Introduction
September

The nation’s yearly liturgy began with Memorial Day honoring our war dead. It peaked with the fiery displays of the Fourth of July celebrating our independence. It began to taper off with the Labor Day Weekend as we tried to get in one last lick at summer before settling down in earnest to school and to work. The national liturgy ends finally with Thanksgiving Day (that mother of all the nation’s feasts) when “over the river and through the woods to grandmother’s house we go” to give thanks. After that, the Church’s liturgy takes over with Advent in preparation for Christmas 2009.

In northern climes September is a definite turning point; the first signs of fall begin to appear. Driving along a country road these days you suddenly come upon spotty swaths of gold and red on a herd of maple trees grazing on a hillside. Through windows ajar at night now you breathe in cool wafts of autumn air, as you lie cozily under an added blanket and listen to crickets singing of summer spent.

Luther’s problem: terror

The second reading from James brings to mind that great historical controversy of the sixteenth century concerning Justification. That controversy was about how are we justified – how are we put right with God? It was about what we must do to make God feel good about us. It was that issue, even more than the abuses of the sixteenth century church, which fired up the Reformation led by Martin Luther. (1483-1546)

Luther was a devout Augustinian monk immersed in the Roman Catholic piety of his day. Working hard at trying to put himself right with God, he scrupulously performed all the monastic observances, subjecting himself to an arduous regimen of praying, fasting and scourging his body. Despite all his efforts, at the end of the day he felt that his good works hadn’t worked. He felt they hadn’t succeeded in making God feel good about him, and that terrified Luther.

Luther’s solution: amazing grace

How did he manage to lift himself out of his terror and despair? One day as he was studying St. Paul’s Epistle to Romans in his heated study in the tower of the Black Cloister in Wittenberg, he came upon the words, “For the Gospel (the Good News) reveals how God puts us right with Himself: this is accomplished from start to finish through faith. As scripture says, `The righteous shall live by faith.[3]’” (Rom 1:17) Luther also found the same consoling Good News in Paul’s epistle to Galatians that we are justified not by works but by grace alone. (Gal 3: 13; l5: 1) At that moment in the tower, he tells us, he rediscovered the Gospel, and all heaven opened to comfort his tormented soul.

In what seemed to be a privileged moment of revelation Luther, who had exhausted himself trying to buy God off with his good works, discovered the incredibly Good News that salvation is free: the price that Luther couldn’t pay Christ had already paid for him by His death on the cross. That Good News freed the terrified Luther from the impossible task of trying to buy God off with good works, and it opened heaven for him.

Luther’s amazing discovery couldn’t contain itself; it burst forth into that battle hymn of the Reformation: Amazing Grace. That hymn is filled with heartfelt gratitude that what sinful wretches could not do for themselves Christ did for them upon the cross.

Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound,That saved a wretch like me -I once was lost but now am found, Was blind, but now, I see.

Even Catholics love that great Protestant hymn, although we perhaps don’t sing it with the full overtones of the Reformation.

A straw epistle

No wonder then that Luther had no use for the epistle of St. James. It seemed to deflate the wonderful and relieving Good News he had come upon in the tower that good works don’t work before God but faith alone does. Accordingly, he questioned the canonicity of James’ letter. He called it “an epistle of straw and destitute of evangelical character.”

Some Roman Catholics, however, call it “The Achilles heel of the Reformation.” Who’s right in that historical controversy over Justification? Who’s right in that centuries-old battle between faith and good works (a controversy which, by the way, has lost much of its urgency today, when people are not very conflicted either by faith or by good works)? Who’s right? The Lutherans or the Catholics?

The Lutherans are right.

Lutherans who protest that good works don’t work for God are right. Protestant theologian Paul Tillich writes that all our virtue is flawed: there is pride in our humility, selfishness in our generosity, self-centeredness in our God-centered lives. It's divine mercy and grace, he says, that puts human endeavor beyond tragedy. Without mercy and grace not only our bad works but also our good works would terrorize our conscience.

The Lutherans are right: good works don’t work for God. That message, so strange to our capitalistic society, is woven throughout the New Testament. It’s in the parable about laborers in a vineyard who worked all day long in the heat, only to receive at sunset the very same pay as those who came much later. (Mt 20: 1-16) It’s found also in the parable about the two men who went up to the temple to pray. One was a Pharisee who got up to pray and told God about his good works -- how he fasted twice a week and paid tithes on all his income. The other was a tax collector who had no good works to show for himself. He simply bowed down to the ground and asked for mercy. When the sun set that day, the tax collector, not the Pharisee, went home justified – set right -- in the sight of God. (Lk 18:9-14)

And Catholics are right.

But Catholics also are right: good works do work. They might not work for God, but they do, indeed, work for us. Jesus said they work: “I was hungry and you gave me to eat. I was thirsty and you gave me to drink. I was naked and you clothed me. Come, therefore, you blessed of my Father and take possession of the kingdom prepared for you from the beginning of creation.” (Mt 25:33-40)

Catholics are right: good works do work. They might not work for God, but they do, indeed, work for us. That message is woven into Jesus’ parables. It’s in the parable of the master who puts one of his servants in charge of his fellow servants before taking off for a wedding party. The servant in charge is a good man. He doesn’t eat and drink with the drunkards in the house. He doesn’t beat up on the other servants in his charge. He’s kind and gives them food at feeding time. He doesn’t sleep on the job. He’s vigilant and wakeful. No matter when the master comes home, whether at midnight or even later, the servant is ready to open the door as soon as the master knocks. When the master returns from the wedding party, he’s very pleased and rewards the good works of his servant. He dons an apron, prepares a fine dinner, seats his servant at table and serves him. (Lk 12:35-44)

Again, Catholics are right: good works do work. They might not work for God, but they do, indeed, work for us. That’s the message also of the Good Samaritan parable. On the road to Jericho one day a man was waylaid by robbers and left half-dead. Along came a Samaritan who stopped and poured the oil of compassion upon the poor man’s wounds and carried him to the nearest inn where he paid for his care and cure. (Lk 10:30-37) The Samaritan’s good work might not have worked for God, but it did, indeed, work for the poor man who desperately needed help. More importantly, it worked for the Samaritan himself. He needed his own good work even more urgently than the victim himself; it turned him into that immortal Good Samaritan of all ages.

Conclusion
Strange news but Good News

Good works don’t work before God. That’s strange news for us who from mother’s milk were told by elders and even at times by preachers to “Be good, and God will love you!” Good works don’t work before God. That’s strange news, because it introduces us to a brand new kind of God: a God who does not hate us because we are bad, and a God who does not love us because we are good; rather, a God who loves us because He is good! And that strange news is Good News, indeed!

[1] By the “the unchurched” is especially meant not those who have left the church but those whom the church institution has left!

[2] Acts of the Apostles 17:24

[3] Hab 2:4)

Ted Kennedy 1932-2009
Arlington Cemetery as night drew on

A “Liberal Lion” & Now a Patron Saint

September 6, 2009, Twenty-third Sunday in Ordinary Time
James 2:1-5 Isaiah 35:4-7 Mark 7:31-37

To the churched and unchurched[1]
gathered in a church not built by human hands[2]

Second reading from James

Dear brothers and sisters, how can you claim that you belong to the Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory, if you show favoritism to rich people and look down on the poor? Suppose a man comes into your church who is dressed in expensive clothes and is wearing expensive rings on his fingers. Suppose also that at the same time another man comes into your church who is poor and shabbily dressed. Suppose finally that you make a lot of fuss over the rich guy and say to him, “Here’s a good seat for you,” but you say to the poor guy, ”You can stand over there or sit over here on the floor by my feet.” Dear brothers and sisters, by such behavior you have turned yourself into judges, and into corrupt judges at that. I tell you that God has chosen the poor of this world to be rich in faith and to possess the Kingdom which He has promised to those who love Him.

The word of the Lord
Thanks be to God

Alleluia, alleluia.
A reading from the holy Gospel according to Mark

Glory to you, Lord.

Again Jesus left the district of Tyre and went by way of Sidon to the Sea of Galilee, into the district of the Decapolis. Some people brought him a man who was deaf and could hardly speak. They begged Jesus to lay his hand on him. So He took the man off to the side, away from the crowd, put his finger into the man’s ears and spat upon his eyes. Then looking up to heaven He groaned and exclaimed “Ephphatha!”— that is -- “Be thou opened!” And immediately the man’s ears were opened and his tongue was loosened, and he could speak clearly. Jesus ordered the people not to tell anyone. But the more He ordered them not to, the more they proclaimed it. They were completely amazed and said, “Everything He does is wonderful. He even makes the deaf hear and the mute speak.”

The Gospel of the Lord.
Praise to you, Lord Jesus Christ.

----------------
Introduction
Favoring the rich

Members of the early church, for the most part, were rather insignificant people. In I Corinthians Paul writes, “Brothers and sisters, remember what you were when God first called you: few of you were well-educated or influential or nobly born according to worldly standards.” (I Cor. 1:26) When in the course of time people of greater economic means and influence joined the early church, a problem arose. In the second reading today St. James voices that problem when he writes, “Dear brothers and sisters, how can you claim to belong to the Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory, if you show favoritism for rich people and look down on the poor?” (James 2:1)

Favoring the poor

In the Old Testament there is, indeed, a favoritism, but it is for the poor. In Isaiah we read, “The spirit of the Lord God is upon me. He has chosen me and sent me to bring good news to the poor, to heal the brokenhearted, to announce liberty to captives and freedom to prisoners.” (Is. 61: 1) That same favoritism for poor people is found also in the New Testament. At the beginning of his public ministry, Jesus makes it clear that the poor have a preferential spot in his heart. Luke quotes Jesus as declaring quite unqualifiedly, “Blessed are you poor; the Kingdom of God is yours!” (Lk. 6:20) Matthew is more qualifying: he has Jesus saying, “Blessed are the poor in spirit; the Kingdom of heaven is theirs” (Mt 5:3)

That qualification implies that the rich who are poor in spirit are blessed, and the Kingdom of heaven is theirs. (Blessed, then, is that rich lady Eunice Kennedy Shriver who died August 11, 2009; she was, indeed, poor in spirit, and the Kingdom of heaven is now hers.) By the same token, Matthew’s qualification “in spirit” also implies that the materially poor who lust after things are not poor in spirit, and the kingdom of God is not theirs.

The trouble with being very well-off is that wealth brings great security. When we’re rich – when we live in a very nice house and the mortgage is all paid off, when we have plenty of good healthy (non-starchy) food to eat, money in the bank and above all (in the light of the present national debate) very good health insurance, we’re not much threatened by the world around us. With such security, one doesn’t feel very dependent on anything or anyone, unless, of course, we are a remarkable person like rich Eunice Shriver. Though rich she always felt that she needed something which only God could offer.

A beggar in a marketplace

In the second reading, James paints a scenario of a man coming into the Christian assembly, well-fed, expensively dressed and his fingers bedecked with rings. At the same time there enters a man with a skinny frame, shabbily dressed and a look of hunger on his boney face. Furthermore, the scenario has one making a big fuss over the rich man and shoving the poor man off to the side. That scenario is like a page ripped out of the life of St. Francis of Assisi.

No true biographer of the saint would ever neglect to tell the story about Francis who one day is working in his father’s shop which deals in costly velvets and fine embroideries. A prominent merchant of the town enters, and at the very same time there enters a beggar asking for alms, perhaps in a tactless manner. Francis does what we are all tempted to do when confronted in one and the same moment by a fine gentleman and a “bum”: he takes care of the "nice guy” first. How natural!

When the rich man’s business is finished and he leaves, Francis suddenly realizes that the beggar has quietly slipped away as unworthy of attention. Of that moment Chesterton[3] writes that Francis bolted from his father’s booth, left all the bales of precious velvets and fine embroideries unprotected, and went racing across the marketplace “like an arrow straight from the bow." After running through the narrow and winding streets of Assisi, he finally comes upon the beggar and heaps a hefty sum of his father’s money upon the astonished man.

Francis sang a new song about poor people. In the old song you pretended the beggar wasn’t there, or you tossed him a coin to get rid of him (or today you dismiss the poor man off to some agency which in turn dismisses him off to another agency). In the new song you speed towards the beggar, "like an arrow straight from the bow."

Daily we are confronted with James’ scenario and with Francis’ quandary in his father’s shop. Daily we’re tempted to fuss over someone who looks well-off and dismiss someone who looks shabby. Daily we are challenged to race toward a poor person "like an arrow straight from the bow."

A beggar in a parking lot

Recently I was so confronted and challenged. To beat the heat of an August day here in Texas and to get in my daily walk I drove into town early one morning to a large Walmart parking lot which was still quite empty. At the far end of the lot and off to the side someone had parked his pick-up truck, into which he had thrown his life’s possession. Beside his truck he had opened a canvass cot upon which he was sleeping. After my walk I got into the car and drove near the parked pick-up. The man by then had risen from v sdwhat for me could only have been a thoroughly sleepless night on a meager cot, through a muggy Texas night, on a well-lit parking lot thoroughfare and under a star-studded sky.

I approached the gentleman’s “campsite.” He was, I believe, in his sixties. He was overweight as the poor tend to be overweight because of a starchy diet, and a tooth or two were missing from his mouth. He had not yet taken his “morning ablutions” and looked a bit besmeared. I lowered the car window to ask him where he was headed. “To south Texas,” I believe he said. “Got some money for gas,” I asked? I knew he’d say no. Then I handed him a twenty. (What in the world can you do with a measly twenty in such a state of affairs?) He was quite surprised by my “free-will offering.” I had freely offered him something, when, in fact, he had asked for nothing. He stuck out a grimy hand to shake my hand and wished me a heartfelt “God bless you.”

A moment of revelation and gratitude

It was a moment of revelation for me -- a moment filled with a sense that something more than meets the eye had just happened. Just as it was a moment of revelation which sent Francis dashing out of his father’s shop to catch up to a beggar he had ignored, and to unload on him a good amount of his father’s money. At that moment he, too, suspected that something more than meets the eye had just happened.

For me the encounter in the parking lot was also a moment of gratitude. I found myself thanking God that I had not ignored the man, as Francis had at first ignored the beggar. I found myself thanking God for enabling me to see what many others in that parking lot would not see, either because they would choose not to see, or because they would simply be obeying that convenient golden rule of our culture to “mind your own business.”

I saw what I saw because I myself was born of poor Italian stock, and that makes it disturbingly easy for me to have a feel for poor folk. But it doesn’t always work that way. At times the poor who manage to dig themselves out of their poverty choose not to look back. That’s the case with some sport stars who have journeyed out of poverty and made it to the top, and who now live in obscene mansions.

This, however, is also true: while it might not be easy for wealthy people to have a feel for poor folk, it is, nevertheless, possible. Francis of Assisi, Eunice Kennedy Shriver and Ted Kennedy were all rich people, but they had a feel for unfortunate folk.

The public option

In the healthcare debate raging in the nation with full fury at the present moment, it’s impossible not to hear talk about the "public option.” That would be a government insurance program (like Medicare, Medicaid or the veterans healthcare system) which would cover a wide swath of the public, and which would compete with the private insurance market. There are loud voices pro and contra the public option. There are those who are quite satisfied with their own private healthcare insurance, and are staunchly opposed to the public option. In general, they fear anything run by the government. In particular, they fear that the public option would run their own private insurance agency out of business, and that fills them with fear.

Then there are the uninsured or underinsured who would rejoice in a public option which, at long last, would provide them with the healthcare they need like anyone else. The debate rages on. However the debate goes, people of faith believe, as Sen. Kennedy did, indeed, believe, that healthcare is not a privilege but a fundamental right of everyone. That was his bottom line and his consuming issue.

A liberal lion & now a patron saint

Shortly before midnight Tuesday August 25, 2009, Kennedy, beloved in Boston and beyond, died at his home in Hyannis Port, Mass., at age 77. His death came less than two weeks after the death of his sister Eunice Kennedy Shriver who founded Special Olympics[4] which grew to encompass 3 million athletes in 181 countries, though her concern for people was far more multifaceted than mere athletics.

Ted Kennedy was unabashedly “a liberal lion” who could, however, reach across the political aisle, when the issue at hand called for it. For nearly half a century in the Senate, Ted’s driving legislative priority was universal healthcare. It was the love of his life. He used to say that he’d see that it would be passed, if that was the last thing he did! He didn’t live long enough to do it. He will now be remembered as the patron saint of universal healthcare. And as the national debate about universal healthcare rages on through the fall months, uninsured and underinsured folk will be praying to him in heaven to finish the work he ardently espoused on their behalf.

Conclusion
Ted’s letter to Benedict

As the sun was setting on the private burial ceremony in Arlington cemetery, August 29, 2009, Cardinal Theodore McCarrick, archbishop emeritus of Washington, read a recent letter from Kennedy to Pope Benedict. The letter was hand-delivered by President Barack Obama during his visit to the Vatican in July. It read,

“Most Holy Father, I hope this letter finds you in good health, I pray that you have all of God’s blessings as you lead our church and inspire our world during these challenging times. “I am writing with deep humility to ask that you pray for me as my own health declines. I was diagnosed with brain cancer more than a year ago, and, although I continue treatment, the disease is taking its toll on me. I am 77 years old and preparing for the next passage of life. . . .

“I want you to know, Your Holiness, that in my nearly 50 years of elective office, I have done my best to champion the rights of the poor and open doors of economic opportunity. I’ve worked to welcome the immigrant, fight discrimination and expandaccess to healthcare and education. I have opposed the death penalty and fought to end war. Those are the issues that have motivated me and have been the focus of my work as a Unites States Senator. . . . “I’ve always tried to be a faithful Catholic, Your Holiness, and though I have fallen short through human failings, I have never failed to believe and respect the fundamental teaching of my faith. I continue to pray for God’s blessing, on you, and on our church, and would be most thankful for your prayers for me.”

Ted’s life was not without its scandals[5]; he was, like all of us, a sinner. What makes him a saint, however, is that he, who was born into the illustrious Kennedy dynasty with a silver spoon in his mouth, had a genuine compassion and an impressive legislative record in behalf of those who weren’t so luckily born. “Blessed are the rich who are poor in spirit, the Kingdom of heaven is theirs.”

[1] By the “the unchurched” is especially meant not those who have left the church but those whom the church has left!

[2] Acts of the Apostles 17:24

[3] Saint Francis of Assisi (1923) by G.K. Chesterton

[4] Special Olympics celebrates people with mental retardation or developmental disabilities. Eunice’s sister Rose Mary was one such person.

[5] There were reports of womanizing, his first marriage ended in a divorce, and then there was the Chappaquiddick car accident in which 28-year-old Mary Jo Kopechne was killed but Ted himself survived.