We’re living in a society where Jesus’ understanding of who is blessed and who is cursed does not apply at all. Jesus himself didn’t even live in that ideal society that looks at the poor, the hungry, and the sorrowful as blessed. Those who are poor, hungry, sorrowful, and undesired have been seen as cursed. This is what makes today’s gospel challenging and uncomfortable. If non-Christians hear this message of Jesus, which is called the Sermon on the Plain, they would just laugh about it and consider it as an ineffective strategy to attract them to the Christian faith. Based on a commonly shared assumption that all human beings like to be blessed, this type of blessing Jesus proclaims isn’t what people would want. It is a curse. How can anyone think poverty, hunger, sorrow, and social isolation are blessings of this life?
What this amature social analysis of mine can at least tell us is one thing. Christian blessing is not the same as how the world understands a blessing. Christian blessing, which is defined by Jesus, is not so much about gaining material fortune, power, comfort, safety, fame, and honor. It is actually on the complete opposite side. “Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God. Blessed are you who are hungry now, for you will be filled. Blessed are you who weep now, for you will laugh. Blessed are you when people hate you, and when they exclude you, revile you, and defame you on account of the Son of Man. Rejoice in that day and leap for joy, for surely your reward is great in heaven; for that is what their ancestors did to the prophets." Jesus doesn’t stop there. He redefines what it means to be cursed: “"But woe to you who are rich, for you have received your consolation. Woe to you who are full now, for you will be hungry. Woe to you who are laughing now, for you will mourn and weep. Woe to you when all speak well of you, for that is what their ancestors did to the false prophets." It is not good to be rich, full, laughing, and receive honor and respect from others from Jesus’s perspective. That is not the way to receive Jesus’s blessing. Does anybody feel uncomfortable about his teaching? I think we all should feel troubled by today’s gospel lesson because unlike Jesus we don’t see the poor, the hungry, the sorrowful, or the undesired as blessed. Instead, we see the rich, the successful, the happy, the powerful, and the famous as blessed. Our view on blessing and curse is different from that of Jesus. We can counter his perception of blessing and curse to be naive and unrealistic or even harmful, by asking him, “How can you say that starving children are blessed?” or ”What’s wrong with having material fortune? Can we help out those starving children with it? Isn’t that what God wants?” I think all these questions that we might raise are valid. Yet, there’s another question we need to ask ourselves. Why are there so many starving children? Why are there so many homeless people in New York City when there are about 25,000 millionaires? We cannot say that there aren’t enough Christian millionaires to help them out because it seems to me a lot of them don’t care. We cannot just blame the homeless. We cannot consider this social problem as individual failures. We cannot ignorantly say that these people haven’t tried. Dom Helder Camara famously said, ”When I give food to the poor, they call me a saint. When I ask why the poor have no food, they call me a communist.” We can spend hours and days talking about how to better understand and resolve these social issues. But for us today, we want to understand Jesus. What does he really mean by today’s gospel lesson? Herbert McCabe, a Dominican friar and priest provides helpful insight on this. Let’s look at poverty and possession and contrast them. Poverty is really about being whereas possession is obviously about having or taking. McCabe explains, “We take possession of things. Even if they are gifts, we can either take them or refuse them. Taking is essential to possessions. Being or life, on the other hand, cannot, in this sense, be taken. It can only be sheer gift.” (God, Christ, and Us, p. 54) He then goes on, “No one can take upon herself life; nothing can bring itself into existence. Always we receive being from another or from others. To aim at riches is to aim at taking possessions of things, even, perhaps, taking possession of people. To aim at poverty is to aim at the giving of life, and this comes from gratitude for receiving life ourselves. And giving life is a specially godlike activity.” (Ibid.) Jesus is then quite right to say, “Cursed are the rich, the powerful, the successful, and the famous.” Those whose purpose is to take possession of things and even of people are just occupied with making themselves bigger. There’s no sharing of life or giving of life but depriving others. Our protest against Jesus for raising the issue of starving children, for example, in the Central African Republic as ‘not so blessed’ is not so much of a protest against Jesus’s teaching. It really is our mere realization of how this curse of taking possession of things has suffered and pained innocent children in our world. We see the result of the evil that taking possession creates. When we don’t believe that blessed are the poor, the hungry, the sorrowful, and the undesired, people suffer. When we don’t believe that those who give and share life are blessed, people are cursed by those who only desire to take and take. I might sound a bit divisive to ask all of us, but do you see yourselves as blessed or cursed in Jesus’s eyes? This is to ask, “Do you set the purpose of your life on being or taking?” This sounds like a cliche and I said it before, but there’s a reason why we are a human being, never a human taking. To focus our eyes on being rather than taking is to look at the nature of being as being given life. We never lose sight of our being as being given from God. This way of looking at our lives as being or being given life is related to our Eucharistic practice that when a priest gives the host, we are given the life of Jesus. We receive him, the source of the new creation, the resurrected one, making a sanctuary with our two hands. We never take him. My friends, let us redefine and reclaim what it means to be blessed in this world. We are created to be, to share, to give ourselves to others. Our life is not fulfilled by taking and consuming more and more. This way of thinking not only is a curse but also causes suffering to others. As Christians, we can only be blessed when we join those who are poor, hungry, and weep. When we are truly in solidarity with them, joining their suffering with our lives, we can see the true blessing is in that act of sharing, giving, and receiving and Jesus is present with us. And doing what’s right in the eyes of God will unsettle and upset the world whose goal is to take possession of things and people. And we will be hated. But let’s take heart from Jesus who assures us this morning, “Blessed are you when people hate you, and when they exclude you, revile you, and defame you on account of the Son of Man. Rejoice in that day and leap for joy, for surely your reward is great in heaven; for that is what their ancestors did to the prophets." In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. |
Paul"...life up your love to that cloud [of unknowing]...let God draw your love up to that cloud...through the help of his grace, to forget every other thing." Archives
January 2025
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