THE DEBT MANAGER

Sunday's parable from Luke 16 has been interpreted so many different ways. Some work. Some do not, especially those that insist that the rich master is a metaphor for God.

The rich master is a rich master. Charges are brought against his debt manager or steward for dishonesty. Apparently, other debt managers want him out of the picture, thus the charges.

The manager--finding his position in jeopardy and knowing he cannot do manual labor and is ashamed to beg--does what most anyone would do in his situation: use the system of debts and indebtedness to his advantage. Find a way to make sure that he does not end up on the streets. He cuts his losses by literally cutting his commission.

What he does gets him his job back. His rich master commends him. And those in debt are now beholden, not just to the rich master, but also to the manager.

This is the way things actually work. This is the evil of debt, then and now. That is why the rich are still rich and continue to get richer. This is why the poor plea, "Forgive us our debts!" This is the way of empire. This is the economy of death.

This is the complete opposite of the Kin(g)dom of God.

*art, "Parable of the Unjust Steward," (2012), Andrei Mironov [from the vanderbilt divinity library digital archives]

THE PARABLE OF THE LOST COIN

A few months after Nanay was laid to rest we went through her things. It was very hard. We choked up everytime we found the bills she kept. A fifty-peso (1 USD) bill here. A hundred-peso (2 USD) bill there. Inside a book. Tucked in a blouse pocket hanging in her closet. Folded in an old letter's envelope. Rolled up inside a bottle in the kitchen cupboard.

Like many Filipinos, our family lived from payday to payday and Nanay's "backup system," which so many use, helped keep us afloat.

This is why I love Sunday's Parable of the Lost Coin. The woman had ten coins. Each can buy a measure of wheat enough to feed one person. But only the rich could afford to eat wheat. The poor ate barley. Each of her coins can buy three measures of barley enough to feed three or four. Her ten coins were enough for her family to survive ten days on cheap bread.

And she misplaces one coin! So she searches for it like her family's life depended on it. Because it did. And when she finds the coin, she celebrates with friends and neighbors.

Of course there are people whose cupboards and refrigerators have provisions for weeks. Even months. Some have provisions that will last until The Second Coming!

Friends, many among us forget that for so many people who plea, "Give us today our daily bread," God's shalom is actually just one coin. Just enough money to buy the cheapest rice for one day. Just enough to survive for one more day!  

*art, "The Lost Drachma," James Tissot (1836-1902), from the vanderbilt divinity library digital archives

THE COST OF DISCIPLESHIP

Sunday's lection from Luke reminds those of us who call ourselves Christian that following Jesus of Nazareth has never been--and will never be--a picnic nor a walk in the park. The cost of discipleship is very high. The cross that Jesus talks about does not refer to the challenge of being married to your spouse, nor the responsibility of taking care of elderly relatives, nor the burden of pastoring a metropolitan church, nor to any of the other metaphorical "crosses" we have come up with.

The cost of discipleship is very high. It's completing the tower. It's winning the battle. We don't go build without finishing. We don't wage war in order to lose.

Many among us want to go to heaven, but are afraid to die. Many among us want to be resurrected, but are afraid to be crucified. Many among us want to see a new day, but are afraid of the night. We cannot have one without the other.

My friends, we cannot trully follow Jesus unless we are ready to carry our cross. When Jesus calls us, he bids us, "come and die."

*art, "The Cost of Discipleship," from inductivebiblestudy app, 2020.

"KNOW THY PLACE"

Sunday's lection resonates with our experiences around the dinner table (which, in many cases, is not really round). We know who sits where. In many homes we know who sits at the head and at the foot of the table. We are expected to know our place. And this seating arrangement applies in our churches as well. How many times have we experienced being told that these seats or those pews are for the exclusive use of this or that family? When I was younger I assumed that the name plates were in honor of the donors. I soon realized--after being told to move--that those name plates identified who had exclusive rights to those pews.

Years ago, I visited a church where I felt totally unwelcomed. I did not wear the required three-piece suit for men. I also had the wrong skin color.

Friends, let us never forget that the early church was known for its open table, its radical hospitality, and its proclamation of good news to the poor. The church is not a building. The church is not an exclusive club. The church, the one Jesus challenges to be light, salt, and seed, are people who love.

*art, "The Poor Invited to the Feast," JESUS MAFA, 1973 (from the vanderbilt divinity library digital archives)

PAIN HAS NO SABBATH

 Critical parts of Jesus’s mission are to proclaim release to the captives and to let the oppressed go free. We know these. Both mean the same thing: liberation! Sunday's lection is Jesus doing his mission of liberation. In Jesus’s response to the leader of the synagogue he mentions three characters who are all bound and have to be released. The ox and the donkey are both tied. They have to be released in order to get water. If they are not released, if they do not get water, they might get dehydrated or worse, die. The woman, whom Jesus calls a daughter of Abraham—which incidentally is the only time in the whole Bible that the description is used—is also bound. Satan has bound her for 18 long years. Medical experts who have studied this passage say that those were 18 agonizingly painful years. Whether she had tuberculosis of the spine, spondylitis ankylopoietica, osteoarthritis of the spine, or osteoporosis of the spine, she was in terrible pain. Every single day. She had to be released. She had to be set free.

My friends, the exchange between Jesus and the synagogue leader is not about good and bad. It is about good and good. How do we choose? Justly. The synagogue leader was saying: you can heal her any other day except today. He was arguing: what is one more day of suffering to someone who has already endured 18 years of agonizing pain? That’s 6570 days of pain. What is one day more? Jesus, on the other hand, was saying: why do I need to heal her any other day when I can do it today! For Jesus, suffering is suffering. Why wait for tomorrow when we can stop it today! The synagogue leader’s opinion is justice delayed. Jesus’s retort was justice right now! The woman despite her agonizing pain, despite her suffering went to the synagogue regularly. Did you think for one second that her pain rested during those Sabbath days? Did you think her suffering stopped while she sang, chanted, and studied the Torah? Do not forget this, ever: suffering does not have Sabbaths. Oppression has no rest days. Evil does not rest.

Pain has no Sabbath!

Do you think the suffering, humiliation, and discrimination that Palestinians experience stop during Sabbath? Do you think our Lumad sisters and brothers get Sundays off from the displacement, dispossession, and militarization they experience from the AFP, CAFGU, and private armies of mining corporations? Do you think the pains, the suffering, and the diseases that afflict close to a billion of the world’s children caused by malnutrition, poverty, and hunger cease every time they attend mass or praise and worship? Suffering does not have sabbaths. Oppression has no rest days. Evil does not rest!

Thus, the struggle for life, for liberation, for wholeness, for abundant life for all has no rest days as well. This is why Jesus always healed on the Sabbath. This is why he proclaimed release to the captives and set the oppressed free on the Sabbath. This is why we are challenged to do the same. Every single day! My friends, today is the day of liberation. Of course, we can wait for tomorrow but tomorrow might be too late. Proclaim release to the captives! Let the oppressed go free!

NOW!


*image, "Christ Healing the Crippled Woman who was Bent Over, " from the Vanderbilt Divinity Library Digital Archives (copyright source: Prof. Patout J. Burns and Prof. Robin M. Jensen)

T R O U B L E M A K E R S

What does this fire that Jesus brings in Sunday's lection do? It disrupts, it divides, it disturbs the "Peace": Pax Romana.

The peace founded on victory in war. The peace defined, justified, legislated and imposed by the powerful, propertied, and privileged. The peace built on the blood and bodies of the displaced, dispossessed, and disfigured. The peace that produces so many widows, orphans, and strangers.

The peace where the father was head of the family and everyone was his property. And the peace where the rich got richer and declared heaven-blessed while the poor got worse and judged accursed! The peace where the Emperor was the father of all fathers.

Historians tell us that Christians were never called peacemakers in the earliest days of the Jesus movement. They were called troublemakers. They disrupted. They divided. They were disturbers of Rome's Peace.

These days, the powerful, propertied, and privileged keepers of "Peace and Order" have different names for troublemakers (who, thank God, still include many Christians). They are called activists, militants, dissenters, leftists, communists, rebels, Palestinians, and yes, terrorists!

Troublemakers are the reasons we have hope!

#25percentrevolution
#IAmWithJesus
#JusticeForNewBataan5
#JusticeForMyanmar
#FreePalestine
#EndTheCultureOfImpunity

*image from "Queer Eye for the Lectionary."

RICH FOOLS

I read somewhere that Rockefeller was asked how much money would satisfy him. His answer? More. In the part of the Philippines where I reside, there are vast tracts of land, thousands of hectares, owned by one family. Ibon Foundation has reported that the net worth of the richest Filipinos rose during the pandemic as millions faced joblessness, homelessness, and hopelessness.

Historians tell us that in First Century Palestine, practically all the land was either owned or controlled by the ruling elite: the one percent. And, yes, this group included the religious leaders.

In Sunday's parable, the rich man had a problem. His harvest was so plentiful his barns were not enough to contain them. His solution? Bring down his old barns and build bigger ones. Half of the population then was slowly starving to death. How about sharing his over-abundance? Never crossed his mind.

God calls him a fool and strikes him dead that night. Lesson? We should stop associating wealth and wisdom. God does not.

Scientists tell us that 666 billion dollars can address the world's biggest problems: poverty, hunger, illiteracy, health and sanitation. And Oxfam reports that one-seventh of last year's income of the world's richest can address all these. Tragically, the world spends more and more and more each year on weapons of mass destruction. Last year, close to two trillion dollars were spent on weapons!

How about sharing their over-abundance? How about sharing the fabled "Marcos Gold" now to address the devastation to lives, livelihood, and infrastructure from the magnitude 7.3 earthquake that hit the Ilocos and Cordillera Regions yesterday? Or just return billions of ill-gotten wealth to the toiling Filipino masses? Never even crosses their minds.

Tragically-- like what happened yesterday, and the days before, and what will happen tomorrow-- about 25,000 children from the poorest countries, aged 5 and younger, will die from starvation today.

Warning to rich fools: unless you change, God will strike you dead. Probably tonight.

#IAmWithJesus

#25percentrevolution

#EndTheCultureOfImpunity

#FreePalestine

#JusticeForMyanmar

#JusticeForNewBataan5

#ReadingTheParablesOfJesusInsideAJeepney

*image from Crosswalk (What Can We Learn from the Parable of the Rich Fool?), 6 July 2021.