Isaiah
11:1-10
Romans
15:4-9
Matthew
3:1-12
If John the
Baptist roamed the earth today, would we recognize him? Would
we even see him? Or would we be blind to
his presence?
A man who
wandered the world in tattered rags.
A man who ate stuff
no one else would eat.
A man with no
home.
Don’t we see
people like this every day on the streets of Everett?
Our cynical
minds, shaped by an uncaring culture, sometimes lead us to turn a blind eye to
their daily struggle. But they are
there!
And
we ignore them at our own peril.
John
the Baptist was calling on Israel to turn away from their personal and social
sinfulness, cleanse themselves and prepare for the Messiah.
If John the
Baptist were here today, we might know him as James Watkins. Who is James Watkins you ask?
John the Baptist
was a prophet. James Watkins is a modern
day prophet.
He’s an advocate
for the homeless in downtown Seattle and recently took on a local TV station for
its portrayal of the homeless. The
report called them a violent “underbelly,” “dangerous criminals and drug addled
garbage.”
I’d like to read
you some of what he‘s heralding us all to hear:
James
Watkins goes on to say:
“there ARE predators who come to the neighborhood to find easy prey
amongst our clients. They exploit them financially, physically, emotionally,
and sexually, targeting them for their chemical dependency, their hunger, their
emotional need, and their despair. The average citizen walking the streets has little
to fear from (homeless people).”
Watkin’s attack on my colleagues in
the broadcasting industry is sharp.
And we should all take heed of his point here:
“(The TV report)
The “Most Dangerous Block in Seattle” is the result of a culture-wide practice
of socially isolating economically disadvantaged people who struggle with
various combinations of mental illness, physical and developmental
disabilities, terminal disease, and chemical dependency; then ghettoizing them
through incarceration or institutionalization into an environment of
desperation, and subsequently failing to provide adequate resources for
treatment, education, health care and emotional counseling. And finally with
reports like this, stigmatizing them through sensationalist reporting and
misrepresentation making reintegration into the larger society even more
difficult if not impossible.”
As I said
before, I’ve found John the Baptist right here in the Pacific Northwest. And he’s pointing us all to the same people
the Messiah Jesus is pointing us to.
Sometimes we
become indifferent, complacent and too immersed in our daily routine. During advent, John the Baptist helps to
shake us out of our indifference and complacency and see a deeper reality -- the
world the way God wants us to see it.
With this
beautiful line, James Watkins does the same:
“They are not monsters, nor leeches. They are
desperate people, suffering from real diseases, biological, social, and
spiritual. Offer them your hope, not your contempt. They have already had
plenty of that.”
Why does Jesus ring so true in the hearts of all? Why are so many people right now fascinated with Pope Francis?
Even non-believers marvel at Pope Francis so beautifully living out Christ to the world. His actions are drawing people closer to the Kingdom of Heaven.
Pope Francis is
standing with the homeless just as Jesus stood with the homeless in His day. In fact, news reports say the Pope is leaving
the Vatican every night to give alms to the poor in the streets of Rome.
Recently, he
blessed a statue of a homeless Jesus.
The statue, created by a Canadian sculptor, was itself homeless after
the Catholic Church it was created for rejected it, turning it away.
The sculpture has
found a home at the Vatican.
I think the
reason Jesus and Pope Francis ring so true in our world today is because the
Law of Love is written in the hearts of all humanity, no matter the faith
tradition or lack thereof.
The commands of
the Law of Love are that we pay attention to the people Jesus paid attention to
during his ministry: the poor, the
marginalized, the outcast, the stranger.
When we do,
people take notice. People are inspired
to do the same thing. People
rejoice. After all, Jesus was homeless during his
three-year ministry.
Our parish is
preparing for a special event.
For the second
year, we are holding Operation Stocking Stuffer
for the homeless men and women of Everett.
You’ll find a
flyer in today’s bulletin listing all the items we need. Large baskets are in the vestibule
to collect these items.
Then on
Christmas Eve morning, we will gather at Henson Hall to put these items in “Stockings”
and give them to the men and women living on the streets or in shelters here in
our own community.
I encourage you
and your family to join us. We had
nearly 60 people join us last year and many families still talk about the
experience especially those who helped deliver the stockings to the homeless
directly.
In today’s
second reading to the Romans, St. Paul is encouraging us “to
think in harmony with one another, in keeping with Christ Jesus.”
We may not always see
eye-to-eye on everything in our faith, but this is one thing our Catholic
Social Teaching helps us to understand as important: taking care of the poor.
In his recent
exhortation Evangelii Gaudium, Pope Francis said the Catholic
Church is “a Church that is poor and for the poor,” reminding us the poor
have much to teach us.
Pope Francis wants us all to better understand what it means
to be God’s people and be disciples of the way, the truth, the life Jesus is revealing to us in His person and
what he continues to call us to be every day as we build up the Kingdom of
Heaven here on earth.
One Catholic observer said the Pope is “trying to
‘revitalize’ the Church’s option for the poor … and is (reawakening) people’s
consciences.” That’s exactly
what John the Baptist is doing in the Gospel today.
As we heard in
today’s first reading from Isaiah, Jesus the Messiah defends the “poor” and “afflicted”
and will deal justly with the “wicked.”
Jesus will not rule
with an iron first, bringing God’s judgment upon us all. He will rule in such a way as to bring hope to
the whole world, something sorely lacking in His day and today.
John the Baptist
is waking us up to this reality as we continue our Advent journey. So is James Watkins.
I pray we hear “a voice of one crying out” in our
despairing world, “prepare the way of the
Lord” and heed His call.
