The Sunday Gospel
If you want to know what to believe, study the Creed: if you want to know how to pray, study the Our Father; and if you want to know how to behave, study the Sermon on the Mount. In today’s Mass we have Luke’s version of the Beatitudes at the beginning of that major sermon which is the charter for Christian living (Luke 6:17. 20-26). We are probably more familiar with Matthew’s version which has eight Beatitudes, whereas Luke has only four.
The translation used in our Mass Lectionary uses the word happy, whereas more recent translations have returned to the word blessed. Happy describes how one is feeling while to be called blessed describes how one is seen in God’s eyes. I don’t think anybody would be happy while suffering hatred and persecution but faith in God might enable a person to understand persecution as a blessed union with Jesus in his passion.
A level playing pitch
Matthew situates the story on a mountain with Jesus standing there like Moses introducing the people to the commandments as the terms of their covenant with God. Luke prefers a more humble setting, picturing Jesus coming down to a piece of level ground. At a session of Gospel sharing, a man with a sporting background noted that Jesus was establishing a level playing pitch for all. It was an astute observation because what Jesus proclaimed was a kingdom of justice and equality.
The people to whom Jesus was preaching had come from far and near to hear him and to be cured of their diseases. His sermon offered the cure for a diseased world of inequality, injustice, war, hunger and persecution.
Back in the time of Jesus there were misguided teachers, the blind leading the blind, who saw God’s blessing in the four p-words: prosperity, power, popularity and prestige (‘when everyone speaks well of you’). These misguided teachers are still to be heard today. Their religion is a personal hotline with God without social obligations. They preach that God’s blessing is to be seen in prosperity in business, success in sport, avoidance of accidents, enjoying prestige and position in society. Call it the ‘Prosperity Gospel’ or ‘Cadillac Christianity’. But what about the poor, or those who constantly experience bad luck, mishaps or constant suffering? The easy answer is that these are cursed conditions, brought about by sin. But many who are suffering are not notorious sinners. Ah, they say, there must be serious sin back in the family tree.
Upside down
Jesus turned the ideas of the ‘Prosperity Gospel’ upside down. Blessed are the poor and powerless, those who are mourning, even those who lack food, or who are suffering persecution or abuse of any kind. By calling these people blessed, Jesus asserts that God’s heart holds a very special compassion for them.
Lest the lesson be open to misinterpretation, Jesus follows the four blessings with four warnings introduced with “Alas”. Alas for you who are rich…who have plenty to eat now…who are laughing now…or when everyone speaks well of you! It anticipates the description of the final judgement in Chapter 25 of Matthew. “I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink…in so far as you neglected to do this to the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you neglected to do it to me.”
True identity
If you want to know how to behave as a Christian, follow the Beatitudes. The great sermon of Jesus is the magna carta of the kingdom of God on earth. Pope Francis refers to the Beatitudes as the identity card of a Christian. He came to Rome from a background of being among the very poor people in the shanty towns around Buenos Aires. Among these victims of social injustice and discrimination, he found many people with an extraordinary depth of faith. Their faith enables them to discern their unity with the suffering Christ. It produces a mysterious wisdom. Saint Paul wrote that Jesus became poor for our sake so as to make us rich. He wasn’t referring to financial wealth but to a blessed union with God.
Pope Francis, in his apostolic exhortation on the proclamation of the Gospel in today’s world, reflects on the faith of these people. “This is why I want a Church which is poor and for the poor. They have much to teach us. In their difficulties they know the suffering Christ. We need to let ourselves be evangelised by them. The new evangelisation is an invitation to acknowledge the saving power at work in their lives. We are called to find Christ in them, to lend our voices to their causes, but also to be their friends, to listen to them, to speak for them and to embrace the mysterious wisdom which God wishes to share with us through them” (The Joy of the Gospel, par. 198).
When a pope writes like that, it is hardly surprising that he is not too popular among the Cadillac Catholics. Remember what Jesus said when a rich young man refused the invitation to follow him, and walked away from him: “How hard it is for those who are rich to enter the kingdom of God.” You enter the kingdom by letting the kingdom enter you in thought and action.
Prayer
Our Father in heaven, thy kingdom come. Give us the grace to turn away from false gods, ideals and values. May we walk in the light of the Gospel. May we be totally committed to your kingdom, a kingdom of truth and life, a kingdom of holiness and grace, a kingdom of justice, love and peace.
Fr Silvester O’Flynn’s book, Gospel, Reflections and Prayers is available at Columba Books.