AMERICA ARE YOU LISTENING?

This week has brought pain and hurt to an already uncertain time. The death of George Floyd seems to be the straw that broke the camel’s back, AGAIN. Through the complexity of all we're feeling right now, it seems that listening is our country’s greatest challenge. Today’s psalm reminds us that in “the sum of our years, being 70 or 80, if we are strong, that most of them are fruitless toil, for they pass quickly, and we drift away.” (Ps 90:10)

Many have toiled over the decades to get us to listen and see the injustice that continues to exist in our nation.  The loss of life and the collective pain of our nation is a grim reminder of our inability to hear the cry of the poor and appropriately respond to personal and institutional injustices.  In 1967, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. gave a speech at the University of Minnesota entitled, “The Other America”.  As I read the speech, I couldn’t help but notice it seems to have a familiar ring of truth for our present time, 53 years later. 

Dr. King says, "…that America has been backlashing on the whole question of basic constitutional and God-given rights for [Blacks] and other disadvantaged groups…. So, these conditions, the existence of widespread poverty, slums, and of tragic conditions in schools and other areas of life, [including our current pandemic,] all these have brought about a great deal of despair and a great deal of desperation. A great deal of disappointment and even bitterness…. Today, [many] of our cities confront huge problems. All of our cities are potentially powder kegs as a result of the continued existence of these conditions. Many in moments of anger, many in moments of deep bitterness, engage in riots.” 

Dr. King goes on in his speech to condemn riots saying, “that riots are socially destructive and self-defeating.” He was convinced that nonviolence is the most potent weapon available to oppressed people in their struggle for freedom and justice, stating, he felt that “violence will create more social problems than they will solve.” 

In the second letter of Peter we hear, “According to [God’s] promise we await new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells. Therefore, beloved, since you await these things, be eager to be found without spot or blemish before him, at peace.” (2 Pt 3:13-14) 

When does the violence end, when will peace begin to take shape? When we learn to listen, not just hear them, but listen to the cry of the poor. When we learn to recognize and address the little personal biases, often unconsciously practiced, in our everyday lives. When we willingly become active participants to speak out against institutional injustices within our communities. 

It takes intentional attentiveness and action.   Like the officer who was alert enough to move his partners knee off the neck of an arrested protester or the officers who remove their riot gear to empathetically stand and pray with protesters.  It’s taking the time in our everyday lives; to recognize, listen to, pray for, and stand with our brothers and sisters who are so often invisible and disadvantaged just because of their race, skin color, national origin, or any other classification used to unjustly differentiate and separate God’s children.  God's children who long to see promises of a better community and nation, made by past generations of parents, governments, and churches, fulfilled.  

We all have a part to play in realizing "The Dream".  Let us be found eager to be found without spot or blemish before Him, working for and at peace with all our brothers and sisters

EDDIE HASKELL LIVES ON

Eddie Haskell was a sneaky little rat, a two-faced suck-up, and a tinpot bully.  A punk who stirred up trouble; and we loved him for it.

The brilliance of Eddie — an indelible character in the long running sitcom “Leave It to Beaver” — lay in the way he differed from virtually any other child or teen characters on TV: He was a bad kid, with little effort made to redeem or rehabilitate him.

Ingeniously portrayed by the actor Ken Osmond, who recently passed at the age of 76.  Eddie was as much a metaphor as a supporting character on a gentle family series. He embodied the kind of personality that people first encounter on the playground but then again throughout adulthood: the servile work colleague, the backstabbing boyfriend, and/or the unctuous politician.  Real life has a lot of Eddie Haskells.[1]

Paul has been the heart and soul of the Christian community in Ephesus for the past three years.  Now they are grief-stricken that he is leaving them, particularly as he extends a rather dire warning: “I know that after my departure Eddie Haskells will come. I mean, savage wolves will come among you, and they will not spare the flock.”  Many times, in the Gospels we hear the commands, “Be vigilant” and “Stay awake.”  For the Ephesians, this has never been truer as Paul prepares to depart from them.

Paul leaves the disciples with this prescription for what they must do next: “[W]e must help the weak, and keep in mind the words of the Lord Jesus who himself said, ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive.’”  The disciples, we, must genuinely attend to the physical needs of those who are weak, those who have less, care for the poor, the sick, and the disenfranchised.  Not because the Father is watching, but because of the Word we have received.  This is the real challenge, to give of ourselves, to lift up the weak, and empower them with the love of Jesus Christ, we first received.  It is often easy to give money to those in need; it is harder to give of ourselves, our time, our talents, our love and compassion.[2]

Osmond would later repeat his role as Eddie Haskell in a Disney Channel sequel of his old show, “The New Leave It to Beaver,” where Eddie had grown up to become a shady contractor, which felt just right.  The jerk lives on.  So, we too, must “Be vigilant” and “Stay awake” as we too are the poor and the weak.  Our needs may not be as obvious, but all the same vulnerable to the Eddie Haskell’s of the world, as we share in the humanity of all God’s children.  Our best gift to others is the gift of ourselves united to Christ Jesus who loves us unconditionally. 

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[1] The Washington Post. “The brilliant, subversive jerkiness of Eddie Haskell” by Paul Farhi, May 19, 2020.

[2] Weekday HomilyHelps. Homily Suggestion by Mary Carol Kendzia.

BEING SPENT

A young man came to the door of the city’s largest hospital.  A plague was raging through the city so horrible that as many as twenty people were dying each day, just in that hospital alone.  Many of the people who died, were those who were tending to the ill.  It was a desperate situation -- more and more people were falling ill and fewer and fewer people were there to help them.

This twenty-year-old man, standing there, had not come because he was ill, but because he wanted to help.  He brought not new patients, but young men like himself, willing to tend the dying.  For four months he and his companions worked day and night, not only to comfort the patients, but to organize and clean the hospital.  Only at the end of the plague did Bernardine himself fall ill -- of exhaustion.

But this was St. Bernardine's way.[1]  Another dynamic saint once said, “…I will not be a burden, for I want not what is yours, but you…. I will most gladly spend and be utterly spent for your sakes.” (2 Cor 12:14).

In today’s reading from the Acts of the Apostles, Paul recognizes “in every respect [the Athenians] are very religious,” and they want to know how to stay in the good graces of their many gods.  But Paul narrows the focus to his discovery of the one altar dedicated to “an unknown god,” which became a perfect lead-in to tell them about the God he knows. Paul is willing to meet these people right where they are.  He invites them to acknowledge and experience his God, who, Paul says, is closer than they think.[2]

Not much has changed; we still struggle with acknowledging and experiencing the one true God when there are so many other gods competing for our worship.   For far too many people, their gods are success, popularity, wealth, possessions and power; celebrities and sports figures are often lifted to godly status; and there are any number of other things.  Any and all of them take our attention away from who the real God is.  They consume our focus, attention, and energy.  We spend our time and money on them.  We focus on getting more of them.  We make them our gods.[3]

As we begin to reopen our parish communities for public worship & Mass, are we able to leave these false gods to re-invest ourselves into the community of believers worshiping the one true God.  To listen for and hear the Spirit of Truth, who speaks to and guides us in glorifying our one God, and are we willing to spend ourselves through works of service and mercy for those most in need.

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[1] Catholic Online, Saints & Angels. “St. Bernardine of Siena”.

[2] Weekday HomilyHelps. Homily Suggestion by Jeanne Hunt.

[3] Thought of the Day: A One Year Devotional, by Marty Pressey © 2020.