Homily Fourth Sunday in Ordinary
Time - January 30, 2005
J.B. Phillips offers another version of the Beatitudes:
“Happy are the pushers, for they get on in the world.
Happy are the hardboiled, for they never let life hurt them.
Happy are they who complain, for they get their own way.
Happy are the blasé, for they never worry over their sins.
Happy are the slave drivers, for they get results.
Happy are the knowledgeable of the world, for they know their
way around.
Happy are the troublemakers, for they make people take notice
of them.”
Perhaps for some this version would make more sense. It would
fit in a bit better with the way many approach life. Isn’t it in so many ways the subscript of the
realty show craze.
We’re really at the beginning of the gospel of Matthew. In
the previous chapters the stage has been set – we learn the story of Jesus’
birth and his origins. And then in last week’s Gospel – not heard too well this
year due to the snow – Jesus walks by the sea of Galilee and he calls people to
follow him. Matthew tells us that he called Simon and Andrew and James and
John. And they left family and trade to find out what this magnetic person was
about. We can imagine that others were called – because a crowd resulted. He
we’re told that as he walked he talked about the “kingdom” – he told people
about the dream – about how things could be – about how God wanted things to
be. And to illustrate he cured. Now we’re told that he cured whatever kind of
illness they had and our mind immediately goes to curing a broken limb, or
giving sight, or curing leprosy or the like. But we also imagine that he cured
the sickness of fear and loneliness and insecurity and alienation. And the result, Matthew says, is that great
crowds followed him.
And then he gives them the blueprint – the Sermon on the
Mount. He tells them that they are blessed, fortunate, happy, in the right
frame of mind if they look at things not from a position of dominance but
rather from a posture of compassion. In a sense he tells them that if they see
themselves part of the others then they will be blessed and feel blessed and
feel fulfilled. When they are poor in
spirit – one translation puts it that they know their need of God – When they
mourn because they see the hurt and pain of others, when they are meek or
gentle rather than bulls and pushers, when they hunger for justice and for all
that goes with seeing to it that justice reigns, when they are merciful – able
to forgive and give – when they are clean of heart – they are not lusting and
grabbing – when they are peace builders – when all these things are part of the
posture of the person they are in the blest place they can be.
And of course he tells them, he knows from experience that
this posture might not sit well with others – might threaten others – might
make them look foolish and gullible – but he tells them that they will know
that in fact they possess the kingdom of goodness within them. They will know
who they are.
We hold up as icons some who have tried well to live this
way. Dorothy Day, Daniel Berigan, Oscar Romero, Dom Helder Camara, Mother
Teresa of Calcutta, Nelson Mandela, Francis and Claire of Assisi and many
others.
But we need to know that as Jesus sat on the hillside and
talked of the Way he was talking to you and I today.
Perhaps J. B. Phillips alternative beatitudes make more sense
in the world today. They are certainly what we are taught or at least are
suggested.
But it is only Jesus’ blueprint that can change the world –
it is only Jesus’ blueprint that can make us act as a people so that people sit
down an be at peace together – and so that people’s compassion sees to it that
there are not people suffering in the cold due to our selfishness and one
upmanship, and it is only His way that will create an environment where people
care for each other and the world about them.
If we like Peter and James and Andrew and John are following
him then we need to listen to Him and His way and live that Way – and thus be
blessed.