Monday, March 3, 2008 at 1:01am
God, poverty and wealth
Column: God Said What?
Jesus should offend you.
That is, if you actually read the gospels. And if you put Jesus' prophetic side in the context of the Old Testament Prophets.
And one thing that should offend us, or trouble us, is Jesus' attitude toward money and wealth. For Jesus is continually denouncing the rich and calling them to conversion. They (or perhaps we, including myself) are to repent of their greed and return to the God of Jesus Christ, the loving God of the poor.
For example, many have argued that all the gospels show a preferential option for the poor. And one example of this is the story of the rich young man (Matthew 19:16-30, Mark 10:17-31, Luke 18:18-30). To paraphrase this story, a rich young man asks Jesus what he must do to inherit eternal life. Jesus answers that he must follow the commandments and love his neighbor as himself.
The rich young man replies that he has observed all of these since childhood. So is there anything else? Jesus answers that he should sell everything that he has, give it to the poor and come be his disciple. The rich young man leaves sad and dejected because this command is too difficult. He can't part with his wealth. And Jesus remarks to his disciples that it is easier for a camel to pass through a needle's eye than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven.
This Jesus should offend you. He definitely offends me. He calls my comfortable existence into question. His economic message troubles me greatly. And it's supposed to.
Luke's gospel pushes this prophetic Jesus even more. Luke's Jesus stands up in the synagogue and proclaims the passage from Isaiah, "The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring glad tidings to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, and to proclaim a year acceptable to the Lord" (Luke 4:18-19).
Luke's Jesus also calls tax collectors to repent and follow him (Luke 6:27-32), points out that a poor widow's tiny contribution is more worthy than the overwhelming contribution of the rich (Luke 21:1-4), proclaims, "Blessed are you who are poor" (Luke 6:20) and "Woe to you who are rich" (Luke 6:24), tells a parable of a rich fool (Luke 12:16-21) and of the impoverished Lazarus who is justified before God instead of the rich man (Luke 17:19-31). This is also the same gospel in which Zaccheus the tax collector responds to Jesus' call by selling half of what he has and giving it to the poor (Luke 19:1-10).
Finally, Luke's gospel shows that Mary the Mother of Jesus also wields a prophetic heart. Because upon receiving God into her womb, Mary proclaims God's greatness in the vein of the Old Testament prophets. She reminds us that "He has shown might with his arm, dispersed the arrogant of mind and heart. He has thrown down the rulers from their thrones but lifted up the lowly. The hungry he has filled with good things; the rich he has sent away empty" (Luke 1:51-53).
I'm not recounting this to show how much I know. As I've learned quickly in seminary, I really don't know that much. And, yes, I'm taking a few small poetic liberties with the texts. But I think you get the point. We Christians have overlooked the trouble that Jesus brings to the well-to-do, the powerful and the comfortable. Because his is a terribly difficult teaching. It's a burning love for justice.
Now one may point out that Matthew's Jesus does indeed proclaim, "Blessed are the poor in spirit" (Matthew 5:3). And I'd say I agree that we Christians know that a spirituality of poverty is extremely important to our lives. It is a gift from God that helps us to follow Christ.
But, as my wife pointed out, there is no epidemic of voluntary poverty in American Christianity. There is no epidemic of too many Christians selling everything they have, giving it to the poor and living in solidarity with them. And there is no excess of economic martyrs who seek God's kingdom and God's salvation for the poor and the marginalized before their own material comfort.
There are some amazing women and men who have fully embraced Jesus' challenge. And God bless them. But the vast majority of Christians (myself included) have overlooked Jesus' challenge. On some level, we have embraced a gospel of health and wealth instead of a hard gospel of good news to the poor.
So it is Luke's gospel that I wish to focus on. And it's Luke's Jesus that we should take into our hearts as Lent continues. This is the Jesus who is not opposed to spiritual poverty but who is much more concerned with real, material poverty.
After all, we believe in a two-edged gospel. The one edge sustains, nurtures and heals us as we commune with the Living God. The other edge, the hard edge, calls us to repent and to embrace God's call for action in the world.
And part of this action probably requires some level of voluntary poverty. We have received God's free gift of grace, God's enrapturing love and God's own self, and have found ourselves healed and nurtured beyond imagining. So can we really do otherwise but faithfully accept and wrestle with Jesus' difficult call? In response, can we be like the rich young man or like Zaccheus?
You see, Jesus' message is offensive. It is meant to be. We should be troubled by it. But we also should remember that God is faithful and God will be with us. After all, the Spirit is with us. And the Spirit will help us discern God's call in our lives and the risk it might entail. So we should be troubled yet comforted.
God's grace is our comfort. But it is also our challenge. And part of that is a challenge to wrestle with Jesus' preferential option for the poor.
— — —
Kevin Considine is a graduate student at Catholic Theological Union in Chicago, the largest Roman Catholic school of theology and ministry in North America. He is married to a most wonderful woman who keeps him in line and makes sure his thoughts make sense. He and his wife live on the South Side of Chicago. He welcomes comments, feedback or fits of anger and can be reached at {email considkp@yahoo.com}considkp@yahoo.com{/email}. © Copyright 2008 by Kevin Considine.
That is, if you actually read the gospels. And if you put Jesus' prophetic side in the context of the Old Testament Prophets.
And one thing that should offend us, or trouble us, is Jesus' attitude toward money and wealth. For Jesus is continually denouncing the rich and calling them to conversion. They (or perhaps we, including myself) are to repent of their greed and return to the God of Jesus Christ, the loving God of the poor.
For example, many have argued that all the gospels show a preferential option for the poor. And one example of this is the story of the rich young man (Matthew 19:16-30, Mark 10:17-31, Luke 18:18-30). To paraphrase this story, a rich young man asks Jesus what he must do to inherit eternal life. Jesus answers that he must follow the commandments and love his neighbor as himself.
The rich young man replies that he has observed all of these since childhood. So is there anything else? Jesus answers that he should sell everything that he has, give it to the poor and come be his disciple. The rich young man leaves sad and dejected because this command is too difficult. He can't part with his wealth. And Jesus remarks to his disciples that it is easier for a camel to pass through a needle's eye than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven.
This Jesus should offend you. He definitely offends me. He calls my comfortable existence into question. His economic message troubles me greatly. And it's supposed to.
Luke's gospel pushes this prophetic Jesus even more. Luke's Jesus stands up in the synagogue and proclaims the passage from Isaiah, "The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring glad tidings to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, and to proclaim a year acceptable to the Lord" (Luke 4:18-19).
Luke's Jesus also calls tax collectors to repent and follow him (Luke 6:27-32), points out that a poor widow's tiny contribution is more worthy than the overwhelming contribution of the rich (Luke 21:1-4), proclaims, "Blessed are you who are poor" (Luke 6:20) and "Woe to you who are rich" (Luke 6:24), tells a parable of a rich fool (Luke 12:16-21) and of the impoverished Lazarus who is justified before God instead of the rich man (Luke 17:19-31). This is also the same gospel in which Zaccheus the tax collector responds to Jesus' call by selling half of what he has and giving it to the poor (Luke 19:1-10).
Finally, Luke's gospel shows that Mary the Mother of Jesus also wields a prophetic heart. Because upon receiving God into her womb, Mary proclaims God's greatness in the vein of the Old Testament prophets. She reminds us that "He has shown might with his arm, dispersed the arrogant of mind and heart. He has thrown down the rulers from their thrones but lifted up the lowly. The hungry he has filled with good things; the rich he has sent away empty" (Luke 1:51-53).
I'm not recounting this to show how much I know. As I've learned quickly in seminary, I really don't know that much. And, yes, I'm taking a few small poetic liberties with the texts. But I think you get the point. We Christians have overlooked the trouble that Jesus brings to the well-to-do, the powerful and the comfortable. Because his is a terribly difficult teaching. It's a burning love for justice.
Now one may point out that Matthew's Jesus does indeed proclaim, "Blessed are the poor in spirit" (Matthew 5:3). And I'd say I agree that we Christians know that a spirituality of poverty is extremely important to our lives. It is a gift from God that helps us to follow Christ.
But, as my wife pointed out, there is no epidemic of voluntary poverty in American Christianity. There is no epidemic of too many Christians selling everything they have, giving it to the poor and living in solidarity with them. And there is no excess of economic martyrs who seek God's kingdom and God's salvation for the poor and the marginalized before their own material comfort.
There are some amazing women and men who have fully embraced Jesus' challenge. And God bless them. But the vast majority of Christians (myself included) have overlooked Jesus' challenge. On some level, we have embraced a gospel of health and wealth instead of a hard gospel of good news to the poor.
So it is Luke's gospel that I wish to focus on. And it's Luke's Jesus that we should take into our hearts as Lent continues. This is the Jesus who is not opposed to spiritual poverty but who is much more concerned with real, material poverty.
After all, we believe in a two-edged gospel. The one edge sustains, nurtures and heals us as we commune with the Living God. The other edge, the hard edge, calls us to repent and to embrace God's call for action in the world.
And part of this action probably requires some level of voluntary poverty. We have received God's free gift of grace, God's enrapturing love and God's own self, and have found ourselves healed and nurtured beyond imagining. So can we really do otherwise but faithfully accept and wrestle with Jesus' difficult call? In response, can we be like the rich young man or like Zaccheus?
You see, Jesus' message is offensive. It is meant to be. We should be troubled by it. But we also should remember that God is faithful and God will be with us. After all, the Spirit is with us. And the Spirit will help us discern God's call in our lives and the risk it might entail. So we should be troubled yet comforted.
God's grace is our comfort. But it is also our challenge. And part of that is a challenge to wrestle with Jesus' preferential option for the poor.
— — —
Kevin Considine is a graduate student at Catholic Theological Union in Chicago, the largest Roman Catholic school of theology and ministry in North America. He is married to a most wonderful woman who keeps him in line and makes sure his thoughts make sense. He and his wife live on the South Side of Chicago. He welcomes comments, feedback or fits of anger and can be reached at {email considkp@yahoo.com}considkp@yahoo.com{/email}. © Copyright 2008 by Kevin Considine.