A TIME TO CHOOSE

 

A TIME TO CHOOSE

Among the simple dramatic stories Jesus told, which we call the parables, The Vineyard stands out. Vineyards are more common in the Cape than here, north of the Limpopo, but you can call it a farm. Much preparation goes into it: ploughing, sowing, weeding, maybe irrigating and then waiting. There is nothing further the farmer can do but wait.  That is essentially what God does: he calls Abraham but then he waits to see what Abraham will do.  He invites Mary to accept her task but then he waits for her response. What will she do?

This is the essential tension in human life. We are faced with choices. What will we do? We talk of social and cultural ‘conditioning’ and they do influence us but, at root, a person can always choose. I met a man in prison condemned to 25 years for murder. He could choose to ‘do’ his time in bitterness and anger, counting the days and the years, or he could choose to live; to take part in activities in the prison, to laugh and to reach out to others. He chose this latter part.  

Responses to Covid 19 vary across the planet. Some take it seriously for a while but are not convinced and soon become careless, mixing with others as they did before and not wearing a mask. Others plead work and their ‘rights’ and also ignore precautions. And still others simply get tired of the whole thing day after day. The result is a second surge of infections with the death toll reaching one million and even the US president becomes infected.

We pray, yes, but there is nothing God can do but wait. Will we choose with wisdom or will we rebel and go our own way? It is up to us.

This is not to say God will abandon us. The tenants of the vineyard chose badly and eventually murdered the heir. God knew they would do this, on Calvary, but he endured the cost of their evil choice and turned it into a gift of life that would outshine the earlier life in a way beyond our ability to grasp. The words of Jesus run through the gospel and must be taken as a whole; they are the ‘good news’ that crown our choices in a way we cannot imagine. The key is to choose well now, while we can, and not to ‘worry about tomorrow; tomorrow will take care of itself.  Set your hearts on the kingdom and all these other things will be given you as well’ (Matt 6:33-4).

4 Oct 2020  Sunday 27 A        Is 5:1-7       Phil 4:6-9    Mt 21:33-43

ITS HOUR COME ROUND AT LAST

 

ITS HOUR COME ROUND AT LAST

 

As you pass the President’s House you are met by traffic lights that flash green and red at the same time. Is this some message we are to decipher? How often we hear of people outlining their plans and ending, ‘I am just waiting for the green light’. Well, we may see the green but it is dominated by its powerful red companion which glares at us at the same time.

I do not think we should lose heart. We are in a testing time. We have never had prosperity and have no model, from our own experience, to fall back on. The red light discourages our every move but, like Yeats’ hippo, there is progress in the air, however sluggish it may appear. In the same poem with the oft’ quoted line, ‘Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold’, Yeats writes:

            The darkness drops again; but now I know

            That twenty centuries of stony sleep

Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,

and what rough beast, its hour come round at last,

Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

 

Can we allow ourselves to be ‘vexed’ by the rocking cradle of Bethlehem? Can we be stirred by the new born child? Has our hour come round at last? Two events have drawn our attention this week. One is the 75th birthday of the United Nations. Often scorned as an ineffectual talking shop, it could well be likened to a slouching hippo. It puts flesh on our highest inspirations and the Secretary General had every right to list the many achievements of the last seven and a half decades. The UN building in New York sports the many coloured flags of the nations but the unwritten message on all of them is that human rights be universally respected. Despite huge lapses, the decades have shown great progress in this regard from the time of the independence of India in 1947 to the liberation of South Africa in 1994.

 

Political freedom seemed like the great prize but nations soon learnt that it was a hollow victory if it did not lead to social and economic freedom. This is the area where we are still ‘slouching towards Bethlehem to be born’.

 

I mentioned two events this week. The second is the European Union’s agreement on a migration policy which one European leader commented would satisfy no one. That is certainly true but it is still an agreement which represents the best they could do when 27 nations sit down with their hugely different perspectives on a complex problem. The beauty of the agreement is that it is not imposed by some strong power but freely agreed. Even if it is ‘weak’ it is a beginning and the EU will continue to ‘slouch’ its way forward.

 

There is hope wherever we look despite all the dire forecasts. If people everywhere persevere in their good work we will eventually get to the time when we ‘realise our common unity’. (Ephesians 4:12) 

 

27 Sept 2020   Sunday 26A                Ez 18:25-28                 Phil 2:1-11       Matt 21:28-32

 

 

 

 

 

 

HARDNESS OF HEART AND COMPASSION

 

‘The magnitude of her sorrow was also the magnitude

of her compassion for others in trouble’.[1]

Tsuneo Yoshikuni on Elizabeth Musodzi

 

This week in the Church’s calendar we had the memorial of Our Lady of Sorrows. It is a moment when the camera zooms in on the figure standing at the cross of Jesus as, ‘aloud and in silent tears’, he writhes in agony. Mary can do nothing to help her dying son. All she can do is be there and absorb his pain by suffering with him. That is the meaning of the word com-passion. It is not easy and relatives visiting their sick family member in hospital find it hard to just be there. Often they try to fill the emptiness they feel with words of comfort that express easy promises. It is just too hard to face the pain of the moment.

 

Elizabeth Musodzi shows us there is a way. Her closest relatives were killed, some by execution (Mbuya Nehanda was her aunt), during the Shona rising of 1896/7. Virtually an orphan, she was sent to the new school run by the Dominican sisters in Chishawasha. There she breathed in an atmosphere of faith which gradually transformed the bitterness in her heart to a lively compassion for others. Attuned to suffering she saw and felt the pain of women in the new ‘location’ in Salisbury (Harare) whose husbands failed to share their earnings and support their families. One who remembered those days asserted, ‘Most marriages survived because of this woman’.

 

Musodzi used to tell the women about gardens and having an income of their own and not being totally dependent on their husbands. And she showed this by example when she rented a plot and produced maize, groundnuts, rice, pumpkins and rapoko. She did not stop there but went on to advocate for classes in sewing and knitting, for a maternity clinic, registering marriages and other improvements in the township. She started the African Women’s Clubs with her friends and this included First Aid training.

 

This was compassion in action and when her grandson, Leonard Chabuka, was asked by Tsuneo Yoshikuni, a Japanese historian of early Harare, where she drew her inspiration, the reply led Yoshikuni to write as above: ‘The magnitude of her sorrow was also the magnitude of her compassion for others’.

 

It is women Like Elizabeth Musodzi who unpack for us the message of Mary’s sorrow as she stood by the cross.

 

20 Sept 2020   Sunday 25 A               Is 55:6-9          Phil 1:20…27              Mt 20:1-16

 

 

 

 

 

  

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[1] Yoshikuni T,  Elizabeth Musodzi and the Birth of African Feminism in Early Colonial Zimbabwe, Weaver and Silveira House, 2008, p 13

 

 

THE WORKERS IN THE VINEYARD

From Gerhard Lohfink, Jesus of Nazarath, pp 110-114

There is a pervading sense of joylessness in the parable. Work is drudgery without a sense of a joyful harvest. At that time in Israel people had lost their land to large landowners and the Romans demanded high taxes. Farms had to be large, using cheap labour, slaves or day workers. The day labourer earned enough to feed his family for one day; if he was not hired they would go hungry. A denarius was not a bad day’s wage but if the one who only worked for a single hour received as much as those who toiled many hours in the blazing heat, that seemed unjust and inhuman: the latter felt degraded.  

The force of the story lies in the collision of two worlds. In the society they were used to everyone was for himself; each struggles for their own existence. The hearers would expect the last workers who came at the eleventh hour to get a few coppers. Yet they receive exactly the same as the first. This was shocking. Their world was turned upside down by Jesus. But if they could hear the parable they would realise a new world, the reign of God, had arrived.

In the reign of God different rules apply. Work has dignity and solidarity. There would be no need to go home worried and in distress. The early comers would rejoice that the late ones received the same. No one is alone. People are not in competition but in co-operation. People would suffer with those who suffer and rejoice with those who rejoice. Here was something new. This new reign of God is visible in Jesus and his disciples when they learn to abandon their rivalries and live in communion. The parable is not simply about God’s generosity. God’s generosity costs nothing and changes nothing. If Jesus had talked only about the generosity of God he would never have been crucified.

The grumbling of the workers reflects the grumbling of the contemporaries of Jesus who were outraged by this new thing he was beginning with his disciples: a common life growing out of forgiveness where late comers find their place. Jesus speaks of the generosity of God as a reality here and now in the reign of God. This new reality is breaking into the weariness and hopelessness of the people. It is an outrageous process. It makes the lowest into the highest, it causes scandals. And it is happening now before the eyes of his listeners, even though its impact is still hidden. Can the hearers – can we - enter into the story and do our part to make this reign, this new world, come in all its fullness?

Jesus’ words are effective: they create a new reality. In this parable which so exactly describes the gloomy social conditions of his time, Jesus was thinking that the time of this new harvest in Israel should become a time of happiness with shouts of joy.

Fr. Charles Searson SJ (adapted)

20 Sept 2020   Sunday 25 A               Is 55:6-9          Phil 1:20…27              Mt 20:1-16

 

 

PRINCE ANTONIO

 

PRINCE ANTONIO

 

Prince Antonio is 20 today. He has lived his score of years with severe mental and physical disabilities. Now he is seriously ill. In Zimbabwe today it is hard to get treatment and medicine when you are poor. He lies on a foam rubber mat in the yard unable to brush away the flies that constantly bother him. I am called to bring him the Church’s anointing of holy oil. He brightened up and smiled but I felt my own poverty as there was little I could do to help him. He used to board at a school called Tose, all of us (together), but they had to close because of Covid 19. So now he is at home reliant on what help his poor family can find.

This Sunday we read one of Jesus’ stories about a man who was heavily in debt. Pay-back time came and the man was at his wits end to know what to do. He went to his boss and, with extravagant gestures, begged for more time. The boss was touched and decided to cancel the debt. The man was effusive in his thanks but his heart was not touched. Shortly after he met someone who owed him a paltry sum and he could not find it within himself to cancel the debt. Instead he threatened him with legal proceedings if he did not pay immediately. When the boss heard of it he was furious and condemned the man to the worst imaginable fate.

We are all bound up with one another. What I do to others will either bring a blessing or a disaster. Insofar as I fail it has a knock on effect that, most likely, I am not aware of. Insofar as I succeed and show compassion that too has a knock on effect I may never know. But who, among our decision makers, spares a thought for Prince whose life is threatened by a lack of medical care? We are responsible for each other and the parable of Jesus we will read points to how he cancelled the debt that we all incur. His desire to pay the price of our infidelity to God removed us from the worst imaginable fate. Israel’s refusal to accept the reign of God, which Jesus announced, threatened to squander its - and our – salvation, that is, the unimaginable happiness God has in store for us.  

‘Jesus interprets his death as a final and definitive saving decree of God. … he does not withdraw election for his people but instead truly allows that people to live even though it has forfeited its life’ (Gerhard Lohfink). God holds fast to the covenant with Israel in Jesus in spite of everything. Jesus invites us to find and take our place in this struggle in which he is engaged in the world today.

The man in the story was forgiven but he forgot his debt has consequences which are embedded in society. The fact that he is forgiven does not excuse him from the struggle. In fact it binds him more to it. Our divisive Zimbabwe history has consequences that we have to struggle to overcome. Otherwise Prince Antonia will not be the last to suffer neglect. The consequences of thirteen decades of a divided society have to be ‘worked off’ and human beings cannot do this alone. Let me give the last word to a former Secretary General of the United Nations, quoted by Lohfink:

‘Forgiveness breaks the chain of causality because he who ‘forgives’ you – out of love – takes upon himself the consequences of what you have done. Forgiveness, therefore, always entails a sacrifice. The price you must pay for your own liberation through another’s sacrifice is that you in turn must be willing to liberate in the same way, irrespective of the consequences to yourself’. Dag Hammarskjöld

13 Sept 2020   Sunday 24 A    Sir 27:30-28:7              Rom 14:7-9     Matt 18:21-35

 

 

A KINGDOM OF JUSTICE

My nephew is 50 and I sent him birthday greetings today. He has ridden the crest of the wave of prosperity in his country though not without hard work, risks and setbacks. He is not poor

but he is not rich either. He has what he needs and this brings him happiness. The

environment is right for him. The country provided stability, credit and structure. The nation

is at peace and the government is on its toes to respond to the voters. Elections are keenly

fought, transparent and unchallenged. His two boys and a girl go to excellent schools which

reward hard work and hard play. A variety of opportunities are open to them if they are ready

to search.

 

It was not always like that. The country was a colony for centuries and its people oppressed -

second class citizens. They struggled to be free and eventually succeeded a hundred years

ago. With independence their home grown government floundered for a while, unused to the

feel of power and untrained in the management of the economy. But the society was open and

talent was able to rise and be heard. After drifting for decades the leaders found their feet.

Imaginative people pushed on an open door; the economy boomed and the country

flourished.

 

My nephew’s country is not the only one enjoying such fruits. There are others on the planet

like his. Would that ‘others’ becomes ‘all’! It is obviously possible. If some can do it, all can

do it. But there are blockages. There are leaders who do not open the door for their people

because it will threaten their own position. There are international businesses, more powerful

than nations, which exploit the vulnerability of governments – even developed ones.

To move toward universal prosperity – the kingdom Jesus announced as ‘among you’ – takes

courage. It is the courage of the prophets like Ezekiel who we read this Sunday. He is to

‘warn the leaders in my name’. A tough call! Jesus widens the call beyond a few special

prophets to all his disciples: ‘if your brother does something wrong, go and have it out with

him’. We are responsible. We are to announce the kingdom by how we live. God wants all

his people to ‘enjoy the fruits’. But do we?

 

My nephew lives a dignified life. He has neither too much nor too little. His is the harvest

others planted and cultivated. Now he is helping others.

 

6 Sept 2020     Sunday 23A    Ezek 33:7-9     Rom 13: 8-10              Matt 18:15-20

 

SHOOT FIRST, THINK LATER

In the short clip of the shooting, yet again, of a black man in America this week what gripped me was the despairing frustration of the young woman. She jumped up and down in utter anguish and when she was interviewed the words tumbled out in anger and shock. Once again America is racked by unbelief that police are so itchy with their guns that they shoot without thinking – and shoot continuously – a man who was so obviously helpless and unresisting.

We are caught off balance by the tragedy played out again of how human beings treat one another out of some irrational and emotion based compulsion. Why is it so hard to face up to the truth which presents itself to us in every situation and is waiting to be recognised? Why do we prefer to be driven by primitive motives of fear rather than rational motives of compassion? America has a particular problem as they will not allow their government to control the use of guns. And so people are afraid that others will use their gun first. Their instinct is to shoot first and think later.

It is a relentless agonising situation. But we would be running away from ourselves it we think it is their problem only. All of us, one way or another, find it hard to face up to the reality that presents itself to us daily. The reaction by the Zimbabwe government to the Catholic bishops’ recent letter, calling on the government to listen to the grievances of the people, is another example. They could not bring themselves to listen and preferred to ‘shoot’ verbally instead.

Why is it so difficult to listen? To hear what people have to say? To enter for a moment into the suffering that people are enduring? Why is that so difficult? Is it that we do not have the inner confidence in ourselves to hear other people’s words and feel their experiences? Why do we feel so threatened?

There is a passage in Jeremiah 20, which we read this Sunday, in which he confesses he wants to run away. Facing the truth is just too demanding. ‘I will not think about him. I will not speak his name any more’.  Then, he says, he felt ‘a fire burning in my heart, imprisoned in my bones. The effort to restrain it wearied me. I could not bear it’.  He was trying to resist the truth but there was something deep within him that he held on to and even though it felt for him like ‘violence and ruin’ he persisted and accepted his mission to speak out.

Peter had a similar experience in Sunday’s gospel. He wanted Jesus to run away. Don’t get involved!  Keep yourself safe! Jesus turned on him and called him ‘an obstacle in my path’, a scandal preventing me fulfil my work.

It would not be easy for the police on America’s streets to listen but it would be a way to freedom for them as well as the people they so easily shoot. It would not be easy for our ministers to listen but it would be a way to freedom for them and the people they so easily hammer.

But each of us has to think, ‘where am I in this scene?’ It is so easy to say what other should do. But if each of us can begin to listen, and to feel for those who suffer, it could, in the end, become a contagious epidemic – a Covid 20.

30 August 2020           Sunday 22A                 Jer 20:7-9        Rom 12:1-2     Matt 16:21-27