Jesus undoubtedly stunned his listeners with what he said in today’s gospel by challenging their views on morality. Last week what I said along with the Bishops’ prayer for migrants and refugees ruffled some feathers. Several parishioners complained to me that politics do not belong in Church. The way we deal with immigrants and refugees may sound like partisan politics. However, like many others, I see the issue of immigration as a matter of faith and justice, not politics.
The heritage of our nation is based on immigration. Every one of us owes our presence here to migration. If not us, then our ancestors who came seeking a safer life than what they left behind. The motivation to leave their homeland and face an unknown future outweighed the situation they were in, be it economic or political unrest or religious persecution. Despite the open arms of welcome that our country projects to peoples in distant lands, not every one is allowed in for any number of reasons. Those who do enter may find they are not always welcomed. Some of us had ancestors who because of their faith or country of origin experienced prejudice and hardships. Why weren’t they welcomed? For the same reasons many immigrants aren’t welcomed today: fear, selfishness, and a reluctance to love and welcome the stranger in our midst, despite the fact that immigrants are carefully vetted before being allowed into our country.
Last week, Fr. Mike Ryan noted that political controversies come and go. One minute they flourish and the next they fade…but God’s word endures forever. So what happens when God’s word clashes with the words of our political leaders? What occurs when the moral imperatives of God’s word and our deeply held beliefs as Christians are at odds with policies promoted by our political leaders? What happens when looking the other way would be cowardly?
That’s when the homilist finds his deepest calling and the community finds its greatest challenge. It is also a time when we recognize that the word of God doesn’t live apart from the lives of the people to whom God speaks. God’s word gets its fullest meaning when it makes great demands, disturbs our conscience, and stirs people into action. Quite simply, God’s word is a timeless call to justice.
Looking through scripture, we find ample evidence that God’s word made life dangerous and difficult for the prophets of old, yet they did not stick to preaching purely religious messages. God inspired them to speak out against people like the scribes and Pharisees who thought they were fulfilling their religious obligations by simply saying their prayers, keeping holy the Lord’s day, fasting and piously performing religious rituals. Meanwhile, turning their backs on the poor, the hungry, the homeless, and the expelled. We cannot honor God when we do that.
Two weeks ago we heard the prophet Zephaniah encourage those who observe the law of the Lord to seek justice and humility. Are we doing that? Otherwise, he cautioned, on the Day of Judgment we may experience the Lord’s anger. In today’s first reading, Sirach cautions “before man are life and death, good and evil. Whatever he chooses will be given him.” Can we honestly claim to be choosing life and doing good when we ignore certain commandments?
Recall what Paul said in his letter. “We speak a wisdom to those who are mature, not a wisdom of this age nor of the rulers of this age who are passing away. Rather we speak God’s wisdom.” And what might that wisdom be? Could Jesus be any clearer? He cautions us, “Unless your righteousness surpasses that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven.”
Decades ago, many Catholic immigrants from Ireland, Italy, Germany and Poland experienced discrimination, religious prejudice and harassment. With the passing of time they were gradually accepted into the American mainstream. What precipitated that prejudice was fear. Many White Anglo-Saxon Protestants feared that somehow the Pope would muddle in the affairs of our country. Today are you reacting out of fear, afraid that Muslim families who are seeking a safe haven after years of war in their native lands would pose a threat to our nation? The paranoia that has surfaced has regrettably whipped up suspicion toward many innocent peoples and blinded us from upholding the principles upon which our nation was founded.
Building a wall at the border and sending refugees back to trauma and possible death is morally unacceptable and unchristian. Cardinal Blasé Cupich of Chicago urged, “It is time to put aside fear and join together to recover what we are and what we represent to a world badly in need of hope and solidarity.” Pope Francis, the son of Italian immigrants who migrated to Argentina, cautions, “It is hypocrisy to call yourself a Christian and chase away a refugee or someone seeking help, someone who is hungry or thirsty. If I say I am a Christian but do these things, I am a hypocrite.” Pope Francis isn’t alone. St. John Paul II said in strong and prophetic terms, “It is necessary to guard against the rise of new forms of racism or nationalism which attempt to make any of our brothers and sisters scapegoats.”
Another Francis offers a prayer, which should sound familiar. “Lord, make me an instrument of your peace; where there is hatred, let me sow love; where there is injury, pardon; where there is doubt, faith; where there is despair, hope; where there is darkness, light; and where there is sadness, joy.”