Mt 5:1-12a
Zeph 2:3; 3:12-13
1 Cor 1:26-31
focus: We experience joy as we encounter Jesus in the Gospel and become co-workers in his ministry.
Years ago I repeatedly attended the Retreats International Summer Institute at Notre Dame University. On its beautiful campus, there is a large memorial plate for one of this school’s most well-known alumni, the physician Dr. Tom Dooley. This was for me more often a place to stop, to read and to marvel. After graduating from medical school, Tom Dooley enlisted in the Navy as a doctor. The big day of his life came one hot July afternoon off the coast of Vietnam at the beginning of the US’ involvement in the Vietnam War. His ship rescued 1,000 refugees who were drifting in an boat. Many of the refugees were diseased and sick. Since Dooley was the only doctor on the ship, he was very busy giving medical aid to these people.
He discovered what a little medicine could do for sick folks like this. He said: “Hours later, I stopped a moment to straighten my back and made another discovery—the biggest of my life. I was happy [treating these folks] …happier than I had ever been before.” This experience changed Dooley’s life forever. When he got out of the Navy, he returned to the jungles of Asia, to Laos, and set up hospitals there to serve the poor and the sick.
One of Dr. Tom Dooley’s favorite Bible passages was the one we just heard: the Beatitudes from the Sermon on the Mount. He applied to himself the words, Happy are those who mourn: “To mourn is to be more aware of the sorrow in the world than of the pleasure” he said. “If you are … sensitive to sorrow, and you do something, no matter how small, to make it lighter—you can’t help but be happy. That’s just the way it is.” Dr. Dooley had understood something of the gospel. In living what he had understood he found happiness.
The Beatitudes, which we heard today, have been called the Magna Charta, the basic principles, of the God’s kingdom; they summarize the message of Jesus. There are two main aspects to this teaching.
On the one hand, the Beatitudes are words of encouragement, they are congratulations, in places where we would not expect them. People have to endure poverty, mourning, and persecution. Jesus though tells them: God is with you in all this! In his public ministry, Jesus felt drawn to such situations because had compassion for the poor, the sick and the outcast. He conveyed his message that God is with them in his parables, of Dives and Lazarus, for instance, or of the Lost Sheep: God truly cares for the poor and for those who feel lost, he says. And he made this point in his deeds: in feeding the five thousand on the hillside, in raising the son of the poor widow, in healing the sick, in making clean the lepers, in sharing meals with people of all walks of life, and finally also in his passion and death, which are a consequence of his solidarity with the suffering and with those on the margins.
This aspect of the Beatitudes comes out even more strongly in their simpler version, which we find in the Gospel of Luke. There Jesus says: Blessed are you who are poor, blessed are you who are now hungry, blessed are you who are now weeping. Jesus finds that people in need are often more open to God. As they experience the peace that the world cannot give in their encounter with Jesus, as he becomes the face of God’s mercy and love for them, God’s kingdom has begun among them and within them. So, that’s one aspect: God’s gift of grace, present in Jesus, is given where there is hunger and a desire for it.
On the other hand though, the Beatitudes are also a journey of practice, of learning. This comes out more strongly in the version from the Gospel of Matthew that we heard today. Blessed are the merciful. In empathizing with others, in showing mercy to people, in truly caring for them, we extend the ministry of Jesus.
Blessed are the peacemakers. As we pray for those who have wronged us and bless them, for instance, as we set out on the way to forgiveness and reconciliation, we build up the kingdom of God that has begun with Jesus, irreversibly, but which isn’t here yet in its fullness. It still awaits its consummation and we can and must make our small contribution but essential to bringing it about more fully. Both of these aspects belong together: God’s gift and our cooperation.
Dear sisters and brothers, We, too, are invited to experience joy as we encounter Jesus in the Gospel and become co-workers in his ministry.
We can ask ourselves: When were there moments when we found the characteristics with which St. Paul in today’s second reading describes the Christians in Corinth in our lives: When were we weak, lowly, foolish, despised? How did we experience in these situations the strength, the wisdom, and the nobility that come from God?
When were there times when we, like Dr. Dooley, found happiness in alleviating the sorrow and the suffering of others?
When did we stand up for Jesus and his gospel and were faced with resistance and rejection because of this?
We may consider ourselves blessed through these experiences.
~Fr. Thomas Leitner, OSB