Judging, Power and the Poor

            The hypocrisy of this political age is astounding.  I have heard professed Christians talk about the poor as if they were stealing money from everyone.  They get food stamps that they supposedly use to go to Las Vegas and those who are paying for all of this are the wealthy who are subjected to higher taxes of one sort or another.  These staunch Christians then turn around and refuse to acknowledge that people who are gay have a right to marry, or even in some cases to be served in businesses.  It reminds me sadly of the plight of the African-Americans in the south in the years of the Civil Rights movement when sit-ins at Woolworth lunch counters became newsworthy and brought us to the terrible days of the Selma march when peaceful marchers were set upon by dogs and beaten by police.  These were also Christians who were acting against the marchers, who were probably the most Christian of any of the people involved in this situation. 

            Our Lord told his Pharisee listeners not to judge, because those who judge face judgment themselves.  That is certainly true, and here am I making judgments about the people who have made terrible judgments about others.  Where does all of this come from?

            In the Garden of Eden, we have the wonderful story of the creation of Adam and Eve, who were told to eat freely of anything in the garden, but not to eat of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, because if they ate of its fruit, they would surely die.  The crafty serpent contradicted God and told Eve that she wouldn’t die at all, and that God didn’t want them to eat of this fruit because they would then become like God.  So Eve ate of the fruit and gave some to Adam, and immediately they knew good from evil and knew that they were naked and that wasn’t good.  When God came down to walk in the Garden, he couldn’t find Adam and Eve, who cried out to him that they were naked.  God knew immediately that they had eaten of the fruit, he then banished them from the Garden of Eden and we have the problem that continues to this day.

            We are beginning the season of Lent, when we pay close attention to our sins and how it is that we are not following the precepts laid down by our Lord.  We seek forgiveness from our sins and fervently promise to lead lives that are more in keeping with what God has in mind for this earth.  While we are doing this, others are making political judgments that fly in the face of Christian principle.  We are told to feed the hungry, clothe the naked and give shelter to those with no homes.  Our political leaders fight this kind of thing tooth and nail.  It is necessary that Christians find their voice and make the course of action decreed by our Lord to be our own agenda and not let those who would make poverty even worse than it is.  Finding our voice is not easy.  Political muscle these days depends on lots of money and the wealthy have found ways to accrue power.  That is what is being courted by those who not so subtly demean the poor in favor of those who are wealthy.  

            Finding our voice in this season of Lent ought to focus our prayer and our ministry on taking care of those whom Jesus cared the most about.  He spent little time with the rich and made his work the needs of those who had nothing.  In Matthew 25, Jesus tells his listeners about the sheep and the goats.  To the sheep, he says: when I was hungry, you fed me, when I was naked, you clothed me; when I was in prison, you came and visited me.  They asked him when they had done these things, and he told them, when you did this for the least of my brethren, you did it for me.  

            That needs to be our focus in this time.  To take care of those in need isn’t really that hard.  What is hard is getting the Pharisees to listen.