Once again I
recommend reading the book of Amos. Listen to God pour out His heart. Amos says
God will judge the powerful because they are not grieved over the ruin of [Joseph]
God’s People. The life styles of the rich and famous offends YHWH. Amos
promises they will lose everything.
The Jewish
prophets proclaim His word—trust God, love God, obey God and act justly. Prophets
remind His people of the Torah and the offer of blessing and curse. The Jews believed
that there will be a Judgement Day when God and His Messiah will rule the earth,
but the prophets make clear that God acts already and the unjust societies will
not stand. Amos declares doom for Israel, but also for the neighboring nations.
God declares that they will fall for the evil they have done. Moral corruption produces a
bitter fruit which poisons a nation. Nature and other people are potent weapons
to lay low even the greatest nation. What was true then is still true today. We
will reap what we sow.
This is why
Amos is frightening. Trampling the poor is just an accepted part of the global economy.
God despises injustice, and we live in a time where the gap between rich and poor has
never been greater. It is not enough to virtue signal, as if talking about the sins
of others somehow makes us good. We must repent, but economics is complex. Poor people aren’t always
victims and the well-off are not always villains. Not so long ago a cobbler
could sell shoes to his village and make a living. In our own time, Nike sells
shoes to the world and makes $39 billion. Almost half the world’s nations have a
lower GNP than NIKE. The scope of the problem takes away one's breath.
Fortunately, Jesus makes the problem concrete and more
manageable. The rich man is held responsible for ignoring Lazarus, who lay at his
gate. He is not accused of ignoring the world, the nation, or even the
city—just ignoring the one guy he sees each day. Jesus says, look around you
and touch those who are in reach of your hand.
St.
Andrew's outreach is simply that, reaching those whom we can touch.
We support an orphanage in Haiti because otherwise those children would
literally die in the streets, like Lazarus. We provide medical care for the
working poor, support to the homeless, old and financially disabled. We help heal veterans
of their war wounds and provide respite for families suffering with the effects of dementia. The
bulk of our support is to agencies and ministries which daily face more need
than they can supply, but have the expertise to make a difference.
We also
experience that hands on ministry. Our phones ring every day. People who are hungry, under threat
of eviction or having their utilities cut off turn to us, some of them regularly. It is sad because many of them
work, and usually they are mothers with children but no other support. We know them.
We pray with them. Lately we have had not funds, so we can only listen to them. We also grieve over the ruin of God’s people.
Sixteen
hundred years ago St. Augustine preached a sermon on this topic: "We can
understand that we have to give alms and that we must not really pick and
choose to whom we give them, because we are unable to sift through people's
hearts. When you give alms to all different types of people, then you will
reach a few who deserve them. you are hospitable and you keep your house ready
for strangers. Let in the unworthy, in case the worthy might be excluded. You
cannot be a judge and sifter of hearts." (Ancient Church Commentary, Luke,
p255)
Jesus did
not say whether Lazarus was deserving.
Jesus
didn’t explain why Lazarus ended up in that gutter. Jesus did say that Lazarus laid in the street, dogs licked his wounds, and the rich man went to hell for ignoring him....
The Word of God we heard today:
Amos tells
us to care about society and repent of materialism and indifference to the
poor.
Jesus said
to stop ignoring the needy within your reach.
We have been offered a share in the Kingdom of God, eternal peace,
but the Kingdom is justice for all. The kingdom is in our midst. Those who love
the Lord will serve the poor..
As I worked and reworked the homily for the last three weeks, the image of the village cobbler came to mind. It is easier to speak of fair wages and justice on the level of one man and one village. Thinking of shoe sales today, I ended up looking at NIKE which led me to further reflection on justice. A few days later down I pondered the social justice marketing around Colin Kaepernick. That gets really complex. The cobbler charging fair prices and providing a good product is fairly manageable. The multi-national shoe company which involves thousands of people and billions of dollars is not so easy.
*This timeline depicts Nike's revenue worldwide from 2005 to 2019. In 2019, Nike's global revenue amounted to about 39.1 billion U.S. dollars. https://www.statista.com/statistics/241683/nikes-sales-worldwide-since-2004/
The issue of low
wages and poor working conditions turned up in many articles, but there was also
a question about whose standards apply? The moral ambiguities continue. Most of the
Nike shoes which came up on the computer cost $150--$200, yet the workers
reportedly make less than a living wage, only dollars a day. On the other hand,
if the workers are poor, we hear from some, they were poorer before and now they have jobs. The
clothing industry has generated a huge influx of jobs into the
region which has created an economic boom. To further complicate it, Colin
Kaepernick, with a net worth of $22 million in 2016, received a large cash
settlement from the NFL and then signed a lucrative contract with Nike as a
spokesman (both are in the $ millions). Some say he is an icon of a courageous
man who lost everything speaking out for justice. Others think that he made out
fine. Some ask “justice” for whom? What of the workers making dollars a day so
that others make millions? How do you determine what each person should make?
If spokesmen generate millions more in sales are they are worth millions more
than the exchangeable humans who put the shoes together? However, divine
economics declare that each human, exchangeable or not, deserves dignity. How does
one construct a world economy where billions of people in very diverse situations
are all treated fairly, when "what is enough" is not clear at all?
Jesus provides one option, until we can answer these big
questions. Love the ones around you, the ones who you see and hear. Do
something…
