The Law of Charity

September 30, 2007

Twenty-sixth Sunday in Ordinary Time

By Rev. Joe McCloskey, S.J.

Woe to the complacent in Zion…Lying upon beds of ivory, stretched comfortably on their couches, They eat lambs taken from the flock, and calves from the stall! Amos 6:1,4

But Abraham replied, 'They have Moses and the prophets. Let them listen to them.' He said, 'Oh no, father Abraham, but if someone from the dead goes to them, they will repent.' Then Abraham said, 'If they will not listen to Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded if someone should rise from the dead.' Luke 16:29-31

Piety

Psalm 146

Praise the LORD, my soul; I shall praise the LORD all my life, sing praise to my God while I live. I put no trust in princes, in mere mortals powerless to save. When they breathe their last, they return to the earth; that day all their planning comes to nothing. Happy those whose help is Jacob's God, whose hope is in the LORD, their God, the maker of heaven and earth, the seas and all that is in them, Who keeps faith forever, secures justice for the oppressed, gives food to the hungry. The LORD sets prisoners free; the LORD gives sight to the blind. The LORD raises up those who are bowed down; the LORD loves the righteous. The LORD protects the stranger, sustains the orphan and the widow, but thwarts the way of the wicked. The LORD shall reign forever, your God, Zion, through all generations! Hallelujah!

Study

http://www.usccb.org/nab/093007.shtml

We get to keep what we give away. The only way we can hold unto our lives is by losing them. The counter-intuitive of Christianity is discovered in the Second Commandment of God. "Love your neighbor as yourself." The rock bottom of charity is found in Christ emptying himself out of what belonged to him as God to become one of us. The Second Person of the Trinity becomes 100 percent man by his birth by Mary even as he remains 100 percent God by his being one person with two natures. Christ gives us his life in Baptism and Eucharist. We, too, are born into eternal life by the way we live out his love. The miracle of Christianity finds its fulfillment in how we become Christ to one another. Even as Christ identifies himself with our needs in Matthew 25:40 ('Amen, I say to you, whatever you did for one of these least brothers of mine, you did for me.'), we serve the Christ in each other when we take care of the hungry, the thirsty, the naked, the sick and prisoners.

The story of Dives and Lazarus bring this home to us. The rich man received good things in life and ate from a table filled with the choicest of foods. Lazarus who lay outside the gates of the rich man on his bed of pain was not even offered the scraps that fell from the table of the rich man. The story takes up with the roles reversed. Lazarus is in heaven where his fondest dreams have been met with riches beyond his desiring and the poor rich man has only the terrible fires of the hell of his own making. There is nothing that he gave away in life that he could claim for relief from his terrible suffering. Yet there is one redeeming feature in the rich man. He wants his brothers to have a chance for something better. He wants someone to come back from the dead. He is told they have Moses and the prophets. If they will not listen to them, why would they listen to someone returning from the dead.

Action

"Men for others" is the story of the faith that does justice. It is the gift of faith that allows us to see beyond appearances. The intimacy of Cursillo shared is the claim on each other's heart that is celebrated by the coming together of Cursillistas. Each of us by our education becomes part of the word of God by how we share our lives. In our own hearts and minds we might feel that we are nothing. Yet we are everything in the love for one another that the coming back for the group reunion shares. God has gifted us all with the riches of friendships that were born in our Cursillo. Some of us might feel like prodigal sons coming home. Each of us has something to share because our lives would not be the same if we were not part of each other. We dip our hands into the wondrous cooling waters that flows from the heart of Christ pierced on the Cross when we share our stories with each other.