The Rich Man Goes Away Sad

First, since torture is so much in the news, I refer you back to the article I wrote not that long ago on torture.  I believe what I wrote then is still relevant today.  I am especially concerned about the torture issue because of what came out in the news recently — that Christians are more likely than non-believers to think torture is okay.  That Evangelical Christians and Catholics are even more likely to think torture is okay than any other groups.  This is horrifying to me.  What are people being taught in their Churches that brings them to this conclusion?  Priests and ministers need to examine their homilies and sermons and see where they are going wrong. 

One reason I started writing this blog is that as I believe that in so very many ways people who call themselves Christians have gone so very wrong.  They are so off track from what Jesus reveals to us about God, about who were are in God, and about how we are to act in this world.  The results of this survey on torture only go to show me once again how poorly informed Christians are about the ways of Christ.  They may plaster their cars with bumper stickers, and go to Church every Sunday — but wow, they are not very Christ-like. 

All Creation waits for Christians, and others, too, to wake up and get it right!  It matters; it matters deeply that Christians get it right.  Only when Christians wake up and begin to follow Christ, and the ways of Christ, will the rest of the world believe that Christ comes from God, and is God.  As long as Christians fall back on old pre-Christian ideas, and fail to live out the Gospel, Creation will be waiting.  To be a Christian is to be Christ-like, and to bear the fruit of the Spirit of God:  love, hope, peace, patience, kindness, gentleness, generosity, self-control.  And Christians are to continue the mission of Christ for reconciliation through forgiveness and acceptance.  How well is that going???

God plants the law of love in every human heart, and this law is expressed as compassion.  Not everyone allows this love to grow.  Why is it that non-believers, and those who don’t go to Church at all are growing the plant of love in their hearts, ahead of Christians, and knowing that torture is wrong?  What is going on in our Churches that instead of nurturing the love of God within us, the Churches are instead somehow stunting God’s love, and distorting it, until Christians come out thinking that doing to others the same thing that was done to Jesus is okay????  How is it that Christians prefer to create a hell on earth for others, when they pray — thy kingdom come on earth as it is in heaven????  It makes me crazy to think about the ways Christians are failing God, and failing Christ.  I wish they would stop calling themselves Christians!

What I really want to talk about today, however, is the way more and more Christian Churches make lots of room for the very rich in their Churches, and the way the very rich are quite comfortable in these Churches.  There are preachers on TV and radio that even preach that somehow being rich and prospering is a sign of God’s favor.  What gives?  This is certainly not the way the rich reacted to Jesus when he talked with them. 

Christianity no longer troubles the rich, as did Jesus, and this is symptomatic of the failure of Christianity.  There are more and more wealthy Christians who feel quite untroubled in our Churches, even while more and more people are homeless and going hungry.  Rather than making sure no one has too much, and no one goes without, the people in churches have instead become comfortable with an ever growing gap between rich and poor.  While the rich person in the Gospel stories goes away sad, having heard Jesus clearly, and having understood the implications of the gospel, rich people in our Churches stay, and are quite comfortable, happy and untroubled.  Therefore, they cannot be hearing the word of God properly.   If the rich hear God clearly, they will either be converted, or they will go away sad. 

It is common practice for the rich to use money to influence preachers, so nothing is preached that offends or troubles them.  Rich people threaten to do exactly what the rich man in the Gospel stories did – to walk away, taking their money with them.  Unlike Jesus, too many preachers do not want to let the rich, or their money, go.  And so their preaching becomes “harmless and safe.” 

In Luke chapter 21, rich people make contributions out of their surplus, at no real cost to themselves.  Their giving is without merit, and misses the mark.  In other words, there is nothing to celebrate in their giving.  It would be better for them, and more meaningful, to give in secret.  It is the poor who give from their substance that should be celebrated.   

Pre-Christians had mistaken ideas about the meaning of wealth as a sign of God’s favor, and poverty as a sign of God’s just punishment.  Like the nations around them, Judaism struggled with the idea that, if God is just, than it should be the good who prosper, and the wicked who suffer.  This concept of blessings for the good and suffering for the wicked seemed reasonable, especially when there was no concept of an afterlife.  The authors of the Hebrew, or so called Old Testament scriptures, often wrestled with the dilemma of good people suffering, while the wicked were obviously prospering.  The book of Job is a classic study on this dilemma.  Like many good Christians today, Job asks:  “Why me?  What did I ever do?  Why is God punishing me?”  Some good people turn against God in their sorrow, thinking God has willed them poverty, disability and/or the death of their loved ones, or caused their plight, whatever it is.  Preachers too often proclaim disasters as the work of a punishing God, reinforcing these pre-Christian ideas. 

In scripture we learn the rain falls on the just and the unjust alike.  God does not send suffering on anyone.  Rather, God sends blessings on all of Creation.  Suffering happens because chaos is a natural part of the creative process.  The chaos of suffering can strike anyone who happens to be in its path; anyone.  Being good; being Christian is no safeguard against suffering.  Suffering can especially happen if you are poor, and have no safety nets.  Suffering as punishment is an ancient, pre-Christian idea.  However, suffering is not sent by God either as punishment or as a tool to make you a better person.  Suffering is one of those mysteries of life.  It seems we just cannot have life in abundant diversity, with room for ongoing creativity, without the disruption of chaos that can take the form of suffering. The poor are more vulnerable to suffering than the rich.  Suffering may be thought of as flowing around the world in a sort of hit and miss fashion, and you happen to walk into it, or it catches up with you.  Suffering is a mysterious part of life and it just happens.  What we do in the face of suffering is what matters.  The meaning of suffering is found in our response to it. 

Have you ever seen candy thrown from a float at a parade?  The candy is thrown for all the children, but too often some bullies will push the little ones down and grab up all the candy for themselves.  Some bullies will even take candy away from those smaller than themselves.  These bullies are not acting in justice, but in greed.  It is not much different in the adult world.  There are lions who prey on the little ones.  God pours blessings upon all of Creation, meant for all living beings, and bullies push down the little ones, and grab what they can for themselves, even taking stuff away from those who cannot fight back.  Justice is ensuring that each living being receives the blessings of God – the good things of this earth, in an evenhanded way. 

Love is not a warm fuzzy feeling toward someone.  It is not fondness or even passion for another.  Rather love is a commitment of compassion, and is expressed in patience, kindness, trust, hope, endurance, forgiveness, honesty, faithfulness, mutuality, respect, self-sacrifice and humility.  Mostly, love is taking up the cross for the sake of others.  The two wings of compassion, justice and love, must be held together.  We may have a preference for one or the other, but both must be held together.  A bird with one wing will not fly.