26TH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME

Dear Parish Family,

 After having spoken about right use of wealth following the parable of Dishonest Steward, Luke places the parable of the Richman and Lazarus as the Jesus’ condemnation of the Pharisees for their love of money and lack of mercy for the poor. This parable also corrects three Jewish misconceptions held and taught by the Sadducees: 1) Material prosperity in this life is God’s reward for moral uprightness, while poverty and illness are God’s punishment for sins. Hence, there is no need to help the poor and the sick for they have been cursed by God. 2) Since wealth is a sign of God’s blessing, the best way of thanking God is to enjoy it by leading a life of luxury and self-indulgence in dress, eating and drinking, of course, after giving God His portion as tithe. 3) The parable also addresses the false doctrine of the Sadducees who denied afterlife and the consequent retribution our deeds and neglects in this life. The parable also offers an invitation to each one of us to be conscious of the sufferings of those around us and to share our blessings generously.

Pope Saint John Paul II in Yankee Stadium in New York in 1979, during his first visit as Pope to the United States said that this parable “must always be present in our memory; it must form our conscience.” “We cannot stand idly by, enjoying our own riches and freedom, if, in any place, the Lazarus of the twentieth century stands at our doors.” Pope Saint Paul VI (canonized October 14, 2018, by Pope Francis) spoke of the campaign against hunger in these words: “It is not simply a question of eliminating hunger and reducing poverty. It is not enough to combat destitution, urgent and necessary as this is. The point at issue is the establishment of a human society in which everyone, regardless of race, religion, or nationality, can live a truly human life free from bondage imposed by men and the forces of nature not sufficiently mastered, a society in which freedom is not an empty word, and where Lazarus the poor man can sit at the same table as the rich man ” (Populorum Progressio 47). Christ is the true rich man who has made himself utterly poor for our sakes for He left the wealth of Heaven to enter our spiritual poverty on Earth. He comes to us not only in Holy Communion, though that is, by far, the greatest of His gifts to us, but He comes to us also in the poor. He suffers in all who are poor, needy or abandoned, from the child in the womb to the old person dying alone, from the poorest of the poor in needy parts of our country and the world to those unjustly imprisoned. What we do to them we do to Him. The riveting point of the parable is not about rewarding the poor and punishing the rich. Rather, it is about the sense of duty, responsibility and compassion that comes with what we have been given by God.