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Tag Archives: social justice
Only Light Can Put Out Darkness
4 Apr
A year before he was assassinated, fifty years ago today, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., spoke these words for the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. May they bless your day.
I’m concerned about a better world.
I’m concerned about justice.
I’m concerned about brotherhood.
I’m concerned about truth.
When you are concerned about these things,
you can never advocate violence.
Through violence you may murder a hater,
but you can’t murder hate through violence.
Darkness cannot put out darkness;
only light can do that.
And so, I have decided to stick with love.
I’m going to talk about it everywhere I go.
I have decided to love.
What have you decided to stick with?
Gospel Reflection for February 11, 2018, 6th Sunday Ordinary Time
5 FebScripture Readings: Leviticus 13.1-2, 44-46; 1 Corinthians 10.31-11.1; Mark 1.40-45
“A leper came to Jesus, imploring him urgently and kneeling as he spoke, ‘If you choose, you can make me clean.’ Moved with pity, Jesus stretched out his hand and touched him. ‘I do choose. Be made clean.'” – Mark 1.40-41
In Jesus’ time leprosy made its sufferers outsiders, obligated to stay away from others. Leprosy lumped together various skin conditions that like race, gender, age, and other realities show visibly on the body. Poverty can show in missing teeth and listless faces.
On the basis of appearance, we human beings start setting up boundaries between people like us and people like them, insiders and outsiders. We tend to stereotype and even demonize groups we don’t know. The voices of outsiders call for belonging among us, for equality and inclusion. The voices of those left out call us to widen our tents and lengthen our tables. In claiming justice and equality, people express their dignity as human begins made in God’s image and likeness. In healing the leper, Jesus gives voice to God’s intent for us all–wholeness and the communities love forms.
With who might you build a bridge from isolation to participation in economic life, parish life, neighborhood life, or family life?
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World Day of the Poor
14 Nov
Pope Francis has named this coming Sunday, November 19, 2017, the first World Day of the Poor. The Sunday gospel invites us to reflect on how to invest our talents in the world community. The pope’s namesake, Francis of Assisi, models building relationships with people who are poor. St. Francis attributed staying with lepers in Gubbio as a turning point in his conversion. Pope Francis hopes that our volunteer service and impromptu acts of generosity “lead to a true encounter with the poor and a sharing that becomes a way of life.”
The pope’s announcement is a retreat in itself as we prepare for Thanksgiving and Advent. He encourages “believers to react against a culture of discard and waste and to embrace the culture of encounter.” This is a Sunday to create moments of encounter and friendship, for volunteers and people who are poor to take part in Eucharist together, for parishes to make the poor honored guests at table.
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Gospel Reflection for October 29, 2017, 30th Sunday Ordinary time
25 OctScripture Readings: Exodus 22.20-26; 1 Thessalonians 1.5-10; Matthew 22.34-40
“Teacher, which commandment of the law is greatest?” – Matthew 22.36
Love God and neighbor without distinction. This is the distilled version of the mission of the Sisters of St. Joseph, the religious community to which I belong. The mission calls us to act—to love and form relationships. It makes love of God inseparable from loving people in our lives—indistinguishable. The words “without distinction” also call us to reach out to people without sorting who we like best or who is worthy but with openness. All are welcome: immigrants, GBLTQ, people in poverty and in wealth, in sickness and in vigor.
Our mission originated in 17th-century France, where 90% of the people lived in poverty and famine and plague devastated the country. A Jesuit priest, Jean Pierre Medaille, worked with a small group of women who experienced God “seizing” them to respond to their neighbors’ needs. They divided the city and began doing all of which they were capable for and with their neighbors.
Actually our mission originates far earlier. It is Jesus’ answer to the lawyer’s question in Sunday’s gospel, “What is the greatest commandment?” What is basic is the verb love, a call into relationships and community. In answer, Jesus quotes two commandments long on Israel’s books: Deuteronomy 6.5 and Leviticus 19.18. Seldom have people in our country and our world needed to live these commandments more than now, to make love of neighbor our firm foundation across all that divides us.
Who have you seen exploited? For whom are you feeling compassion? To what work of justice do these experiences call you?
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Gospel Reflection for June 25, 2017, 12th Sunday Ordinary Time
23 JunSunday Readings: Jeremiah 20.10-13; Romans 5.12-15; Matthew 10.26-33
“Everyone who acknowledges me before others, I also will acknowledge before my Father in heaven.” – Matthew 10.32
Jesus’ saying turns on the principle of reciprocity. Jesus will treat us the way we treat others. We recognize this principle every time we pray the Our Father, “Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.” The saying challenges us to be public witnesses of Jesus’ way.
The early Christians lived in the shadow of the Roman Empire, which considered their faith illegal. Today Christians live in a capitalist economy gone global that considers religion irrelevant. The revenue of many multi-national corporations rivals the gross national product of nation states. Yet, corporations have no obligation to uphold Christian values or human rights as nations do, only to profit stockholders.
Catholic social teaching challenges us to live Jesus’ message in our public and corporate lives. People are not commodities. They have dignity and rights, including the right to a living wage and health care. Are our senators and representatives in the 117th Congress thinking about treating people who need Medicaid the way they want to be treated? Do they realize people like my sister, diabetic since she was 22 for whom the cost of insulin has skyrocketed, face being unable to afford the medicines that keep her alive even with insurance?
If you enjoy this Gospel Reflection,
please visit the Sunday By Sunday page
to order a subscription or request a free sample.
please visit the Sunday By Sunday page
to order a subscription or request a free sample.
Start a small bible study. Be a leader.
