Saint Mary of the Immaculate Conception Roman Catholic Church

 Dear Good People of Saint Mary,

Last week about 25 of us gathered for our first of three meetings to discuss and respond to Pope Francis’ encyclical on Care  for the Earth, Laudato si’. One of the great things that happens in a large parish like ours is that you discover such diversity of backgrounds and knowledge of people who come together, people who represent such different disciplines as  environmental sciences, farming, teaching, economics, conservation and weather. Then there’s people like me who get to learn from all of you.

Somebody corrected me, as previously I had referred to this encyclical as the Pope’s document “on the environment,” and I realize it is such an error that I need to print a correction! It is about the environment, in part, but this simplification has led many to decide they can dismiss it as a document merely about climate change, words that boil up so much political controversy over already-formed alliances. I believe sides have divided our culture over this issue for personal gain, without really  looking at it. In our day we have allowed real moral issues to become so aligned with politics that it seems people don’t even consider the objective reality of them without the lens of partisan affiliations. Early in our discussion last week, we decided to leave the words climate change aside and look at what the Pope is really saying. He says so much more.

It came up in our discussion that some say the Pope is a Marxist. Another political label meant to distract attention  from the reality of which he speaks. It is true he speaks out of his own experience (how could he not?) of the struggle he knew all his life with South American totalitarian regimes who had no compassion, no mercy for human persons. But he spent his visit to our country not calling us out and condemning us for being a free market society built on hard work and well-earned success, but challenging us to use its fruitfulness for the good, and leave behind the part that can destroy us spiritually and culturally, to avoid what destroys the fragile balance of God’s creation given to us as  stewards, meant to be preserved, nurtured, valued.

He does say often that politics and economics so dominate the discussion that what we do today—in all spheres of our lives and the life of our planet—has more to do with the bottom line and cost per unit than it does with the dignity of workers, their right to a fair wage, the promotion of peoples and the care of the earth. Would we not rather get things cheap (especially the things we don’t really need) than pay what it costs to give someone a good paying job? Maybe we wouldn’t do this consciously; Pope Francis is saying that we have gotten to the point that the people who work for $5 a day in different countries in the world aren’t even remembered as a part of the system anymore.

You don’t have to travel very far to witness personally the damage done to fragile ecosystems. The health of our bay is a subject of great concern, much more than just the price of crabs. What about the changes being made in the southwest, where cities along the paths of rivers have dried them up, leaving people further along without any water at all? Some countries are now trying to replant lost hardwood forests with “sustainable” cash crops of fast-growing trees, often “invader” plants that cause the extinction of further species? Some of these forests require six or seven generations to be reestablished, more time than we have or are willing to give.

I think the most compelling point that Pope Francis makes about the earth is that it is the place God designed where  the encounter takes place between him and mankind. God created the earth to be a safe place for human beings, not a place where the law would protect a pet more than an unborn child. Not a place where the poor become poorer, where indigenous peoples disappear because of another’s greed. Not a place where we consume, waste, and throw away the fruits of that creation without regard to the impact that we have on others.

When I was looking for a college, my parents said that they wanted us to find a college that actually taught ethics in their curriculum. This was over thirty years ago: ethics was virtually impossible to find. This, I think, is the main point that Pope Francis is trying to make with his encyclical. God’s gifts are given to us with a moral charge included: we must once again look at our lives and the way we are using his gifts from a moral perspective. Ultimately we must understand the Planner behind the plan, if that plan is to succeed. He is returning ethics to the discussion table.

We meet again next week; the week after, we plan our parish’s active response.

God bless you.

Dear Good People of Saint Mary,

Last weekend I was in Salt Lake City for the Parliament of the World’s Religions. Let me tell you, it was interesting. I made some good friends, saw a lot of people whom I hadn’t seen in a while, some I saw last week… but it was very interesting. I am convinced in today’s world you can sew a crazy hat and show up, call it a religion and they will give you a seminar. But  generally speaking there were 80 countries and 50 religions represented, 9,500 in attendance. Our Catholic network, CADEIO (cadeio.org), for the first time sponsored a conference- long schedule of seminars and workshops, and provided an authentic Catholic presence where we hadn’t been represented much before. You may have seen in the news that there were “Catholics” there who confused people about our church, some ordained a woman, others tried to let people think that our Church has made changes that she hasn’t made. All the more reason to be there! No longer can we flee from the world because we think we will not be accepted or we will be misrepresented, or even belittled. We must give an authentic witness of who we are. So we did.

I was invited by the World Sikh Council to present the Catholic viewpoint with regard to two tenets of Sikhism that we share in common. The first was with regard to the Langar meal, a  custom began by the first Sikh Guru, Nanak, in the 1400s that has continued to be a hallmark of Sikh life even today. The Langar is an open kitchen, where anyone can come and  receive a home-cooked meal. Anyone. As a sign of the radical equality of Sikh society, all people sit on the floor in rows and members of the community serve them, wave after wave of people who come hungry. I was happy to explain the beautiful custom we now have in Fredericksburg, supported by the many volunteers of Saint Mary and all the downtown churches, of our Community Dinners. You see, you don’t have to be poor to be hungry, and you don’t have to be homeless to be lonely. Our compassion reaches out to all people, us, in the name of Jesus Christ who calls us to do this for the least of our brothers and sisters.

The other topic the Sikhs asked me to present was, as a panel member along with a native American and a Baha’i, the theology of the unity of humanity as created by God. I started with the reflection of Thomas Merton (you can find it in one of my homilies from a few weeks ago at the parish website), then traced the thoughts from Laudato sí (Pope Francis’ new encyclical on human responsibility and the environment), to a beautiful document of the International Theological Commission called “Communion and Stewardship,” to the theology of Henri de Lubac and theologians leading up to Vatican II, with the roots of their thoughts extending back to the first century Fathers of the Church.

I used as part of my presentation a beautiful account I learned this week about the unlikely meeting between Chiara Lubich, founder of the Focolare Movement of the Church, and  American Muslim Imam W. D. Muhammed of New York in Harlem, 1996. She said, “It seems that the Lord has placed him beside us, and the Lord has placed us beside him. Let’s go deep into our hearts where God is present and tell him we want to do this: We want good faith. We want to serve. We want to be brothers and sisters.”

He wrote, ” Once the oneness of God is impressed upon the heart, our nature transcends race, it transcends beliefs. It resides in the heart and makes us one, as God is one.”

When we approach our brothers and sisters in the human family of God our Father, if our encounter is honest and open to real encounter, it is something beyond a press photo or an annual meeting. I used in my presentation a new idea. In another Vatican document, “Dialogue and Proclamation,” dialogue is described in four ways: the dialogue of life, of (spiritual)experience, of theological exchange and of social action. When we approach one another on an interreligious level, that is, the level of completely different world religions, we begin  with the dialogue between God and his creation, when by his Word he created all things and declared them good. This “Dialogue of Creation” is a new idea and, as I suggested in my paper, must be the ideal upon which all other dialogues between peoples must be based.

God has created no one who is deaf to his Word.

We have been prepared from the beginning by God for the moment of meeting, sensitive hearts ready to meet.

God bless you.