Kōriporipo ana I te Tika

“To Act justly, to love mercy and to walk humbly with our God” Micah 6:8

Mark Richards

Introduction

Nau mai Haere mai

E ngā mana e ngā reo e ngā iwi

(E Te (ngā) Pihopa

Tēnā kotou, Tēnā kotou, Tēnā tatou katoa

“To act justly, to love mercy and to walk humbly with our God” Micah 6:8 SLIDE

When I was asked six months ago to share some thoughts this evening, this wonderful phrase, for those of us formed in the 70s came to mind.

So for six months I have pondered, written, fretted, prayed.

Did you want to hear the strategic plan of Caritas?

Did you want an outline of policy responses to social policy initiatives?

And the result of my reflection and prayer was to led me to want to try something a little different

I want to ask a question:

How do we walk humbly with our God and love mercy and how is this related to acting justly? SLIDE

We are a people called to love (and worship) the lord our God with all our heart, and soul and mind, and to love our neighbour as our selves.

We are a people who gather on a Sunday or in the early morning to pray and worship

But

We are to be judged by what we DO, in the noon day sun of the classroom, the market place and the street, to “these brothers and sisters of mine”

Where is the link?

Our love of God, our worship, is linked inextricably with the call to act justly

Our walking humbly with our God is inextricably linked to acting justly

How?

I want to pick three moments of the liturgy (the formal name for Mass) out for you and suggest that they provide a template for how we are called as a Christian community to be people of justice.

And the framework I want to hang it on is the simple one of Cardinal Cardijn SLIDE

See Judge Act SLIDE 1

SLIDE2

SLIDE3

SLIDE4

Part One : the starting point is to open our eyes, ears and hearts to welcome, listen and heal1

So to start SLIDE

When you and I walk into Church on a Sunday, or any day of the week, we take the water from the baptismal stoop SLIDE

Yes but most importantly we take it and make the cross to our head, our heart and our shoulders. SLIDE

We who live the RCIA each year know where this comes from.

The first moment of our encounter with the Christian community is one in which the person approaching the community is asked:

Who are you?

What is your name? And in their own language they respond. And are then asked:

What do you want of this community? Eternal life

And the community responds with a simple call and a simple action:

Then place your hand on the Cross of Jesus Christ, and with a sign of the cross open your eyes, open your ears, open your heart, take on to your shoulders his cross and onto your feet to walk in his path, to the resurrection, through the sacrifice of self-giving and love. SLIDE

As Cardinal Cardijn would have said: We need to see. We need to open our eyes.

The first step in our task to act justly, and to humbly walk with God, is to recognise in the other the gift of a child of God. We ask you to come to the community as you are, in your language, in your hurt, in your need.

It is our task as Christian community is to STOP

1 This reflects the fundamental strategic direction of Caritas Aotearoa that all will be in “PARTNERSHIP”

It is to open our eyes, open our ears open our hearts to the other, to love, to support, to listen, to heal, to welcome, to adapt.2

This requires an ability to see

A willingness to see

To see the reality of the other

Often those we encounter in the work of development or justice, in the outreach of justice and charity, in the life of the office or the school, are angry, are hurt, are defensive, are aggressive, are hurt, are in need, are desperate, are loud, are demanding.

Why?

Open your eyes and ears and see and hear the need the situation.

Open your eyes and ears and see and hear the need their story, their hurt, their history.

Do not judge (yet), listen, open your heart, says the liturgy, the act of welcome to the Church

Open your ears and eyes, open your hands

Help the other to open the story of their hurt and their need3

I have lots of examples, but am alive with Palestine at present having been on the West Bank for a fortnight in refugee camps and with Palestinian groups.

My eyes are opened when the village elders of Aboud can show you their land, each high land, SLIDE their olive trees, in the middle of the West Bank, that have been taken, with their water supply, their olive groves, their livelihoods, and no negotiation, no compensation, by settlers.

So I judge,

Then I need to listen to the Jewish woman I had lunch with on Tuesday who speaks of the ghettos of SLIDE eastern Europe under communist regime, and holding on to the hope of living in a land of faith.

So I judge,

Then I experience groups of young men, ultra-orthodox, walking straight at Palestinians and SLIDE Christians in the Old city, supported by Israeli troops

So I judge

Mark STOP says the liturgy

2 For a Christian, life is not the product of mere chance, but the fruit of a call and personal love. Pope Francis 14th July 2013 Twitter3 This reflects the first strategic direction of Caritas Aotearoa that all will be seeking to understand the source and cause, and impact of all our “POVERTY”

Open your ears open your eyes

Why are people thinking as they are, living as they are

How do you listen so as to help them to open their eyes and hearts to the need of the other?

The first and fundamental step of our task of worship and being Christian,

The first step in justice and peace, in development and in Caritas bringing love to action, to acting justly

Is to stop and see

To open our eyes and ears to the other 4

And to help each other to open OUR eyes and ears and hearts to the need for change and conversion.

We tend to be a middle class church; we are focused on schools and parish plant, on liturgy and singing

Open our eyes and hearts to the poor of our community, to those isolated

Then open our eyes and hearts to the poor of the world 60% of whom still live in poverty.

This requires time, commitment, a willingness to sit, to listen, to go into discomfort, to challenge my own / our perspective and presuppositions.

If we do so we will always be led to the first prayer of the Mass:

“I have sinned in my thoughts and in my words,

In what I have done and in what I have failed to do”

With what do we open our eyes, ears and hearts? SLIDE

A cross. SLIDE

It is not easy, it means dying to self, opening to others, knowing the wounds and the hurt, sharing the unfulfilled hopes. Being the place where anger, sadness, frustration will be laid.

Take up the cross and follow, this is the first word of our liturgy.

If you accept the first greeting of the Church and the Liturgy.

In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, a CROSS

Then you will start to see and understand that: The Lord is with you,

4 We are all jars of clay, fragile and poor, yet we carry within us an immense treasure. Pope Francis Twitter 09 th August 2013

So that is step one as Cardinal Cardijn would say, stop and open your eyes and SEE

Part Two : Formation of our position or view, from multiple sources

Step two; Cardinal Cardijn would say is to Judge

The first act in Jesus’ ministry in Marks gospel was At Capernaum where he went into the synagogue and taught with authority

How

Luke has a similar story at Nazareth

Took the scroll given to him, of the prophet Isaiah and turned to the place where it is written. SLIDE

"The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to release the oppressed, 19 to proclaim the year of the Lord's favour."

What did he do?

He took the scroll,

There were a number of scrolls that could have been given to him

The torah the law and the story of Gods dealing from the earliest time to the kings

The creation story, the history of his people,

Or it could have been the scroll of prayer and wisdom the prayer of the psalms and the proverbs

Or it could have been the history stories, Kings and Chronicles

Or it could have been the scroll of challenge of the prophets were written

The source of wisdom, for him to judge from, to challenge, to teach was multi sourced. But in the scroll given to him, from the prophet Isaiah, he found it all in summary.

The source was rich and wide, and it took years of formation to know, appreciate the interrelationships, the nuances, and the message of God’s covenant with the People.

Jesus’ task was to ask,

What does the history of our people say?

What does the law say is core to relationships so that they are Good News?

What does wisdom and insight of the wise say on this?

What does our prayer say on this?

What is Good News?

And he states the foundational insight of all these sources:

That when the Spirit of the lord comes on us and anoints us, Christ us, it will be to:

Preach good news to the poor,

Freedom to all those imprisoned, in any way

Sight to all our blindnesses

Release from all oppressions and addictions

And a year of abundance, life in community and celebration.

Our making such a Judgment is NOT a simple or easy thing. It is not what I think or feel might be right or wrong. It is definitely not what is to my advantage, nor is it an element that is individual

So how do we do it? How do we judge?

I want to suggest that the process is the same as for Jesus.

Firstly, he was a person willing to step aside and pray, to go to stillness, fast and do penance, so as to meet Abba, our Father.

Then

Jesus stood in the midst of a community and took the prayer, law, history, wisdom, challenge of that community and having discerned he proclaimed the fundamental truth in this place and time was needed by that community

So it is with us.

The challenge to the Church is that we are a community. We need we must develop ways and directions in which we are willing and able to take all these sources and discern and judge.

We cannot fall into the trap of labels, slogans, manifestos, single issues nor be the simple parrots of others.

We need to take the scriptures and the writings of the Church yes

But the example of the Lord is vital, he asks:

What does the law say? Yes law in scripture, but NZ Law! SLIDE

What does our history say? Kings is NOT as relevant as Judith Binney! SLIDE

What are the prophets saying? Murnane, Iti, Bradford SLIDE

What does the heart of prayer say?

Do we have the time, and the willingness to ask? Do we have the courage to open our ears to listen to the insight of the wise, or to engage in the discussion?

See, Judge SLIDE

We are called to make a judgement, an informed judgement, a wise judgement, a careful and prudent judgement5

What did the treaty promise?

What did the self-interest of colonial assemblies do to land rights, and to Maori interests?

What does sociology and social psychology tell us of the effects of suppressing culture and taking peoples land, and unjust actions?

What has been the history of grievances and attempts to dialogue?

What are the causes of poverty ….. from research??

What are the ways of truth and reconciliation that are effective?

What does the Gospel say about a year of return and favour a year in which injustice is healed,

What does our prayer say about our own self-interest?

See, open your eyes, and challenge yourself and your presuppositions and prejudging

Then Judge, not in a casual way, but in an informed, adult and rich community of discussion, insight, thought, and inquiry

Part Three: the manner of our acting, the way of gift and self giving, the Taking, blessing, breaking, dying and giving; and what we are asked to give : our ordinary selves

And so we come to the third moment in the process: ACT SLIDE

There are two actions called for in the liturgy

Having identified injustices or what it is that we are called to do, we are really great at calling out loud, telling others what is right or wrong, sharing our judgement of what they have done or not done that needs change.

The Christian message is different.

Having come together, asked that our eyes be opened, having listened to the Sacred Scriptures and heard them broken open with Good News for our place and time

5 The choices of example or reference s reflects the second and third strategic directions of Caritas Aotearoa that focus on issues of INDIGINOUS PEOPLES AND ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE as a focus for our activities

We return every time tot the same simple actions.

We Take the gifts of the earth and the work of human hands and offer all you have to serve the resolution of the issue.

And in so doing there will be a revelation:

Let us repeat the phrases

The Lord is with you

And with your spirit

Lift up your hearts

We lift them to the Lord

Let us give thanks to the Lord our God

It is right and just

What is right and just? Where what is right and just going to be revealed?

When we take the bread of our lives, our gifts ourselves, and giving thanks for the knowledge that all we are, and all we have is a free gift of love and life from God, we give thanks and offer them

This is when we will see what is right and just

The first action is a willingness to give of who we are, of what we have, or our fundamental option to share ourselves, our bread, our money, our time, our lives with others, particularly those in need

The second action is the specifically Christian action.

We bring a commitment, made in our baptism, to share the way of Christ.6

The way of Christ is one of action, of service, of dying to self and self-interest and having identified that which brings life and love to be willing to die to self, so as to bring life to the other.

This is the whole and core centrality of the Eucharist, and our act of thanksgiving.

We don’t just say what is right and just, we don’t yell at others from the rooftops.

We are the ones who are willing to die, to serve, to reach out, to forgive, and to speak patience, to speak tolerance, to reach out a hand to whoever is standing next to us and say “Peace”.

6 The light of faith illumines all our relationships and helps us to live them in union with the love of Christ, to live them like Christ. Pope Francis Twitter 05th August 2013

The whole meaning of the Eucharistic prayer is that we have heard, we have discerned, we have been formed, and now we must, following our Lord and Master, act! How can this happen, only in one way, by joining ourselves to Him, and His act of loving gift to the Father.

The HEART the CORE however sits in the one little word emphasised in this quote:

It is not those who cry out Lord Lord who will be saved, but those who DO the will of my father in heaven “ Matt 7:21 SLIDE

It is sacrificial, because our predominantly self-interested and self-focused approach to life has to be challenged; it is a cross of dying, because we will find that the comfort of my wealth and privilege will stand as the greatest barrier to action. 7

We heard it so strongly last Sunday in the story of the rich man and Lazarus.

'If they will not listen to Moses and the prophets,

Neither will they be persuaded if someone should rise from the dead.'" Luke 16:31

We know what was said by Moses and the prophets; we can repeat it and quote it

Act justly to love mercy and walk humbly with your God

But what of the one who was raised from the dead.

He has a simple call:

But Lord when did we see you hungry, naked, alone, or imprisoned? 8

What you did to these the least of my brothers and sisters you did to me.

The fundamental and decisive point of difference of the Christian and the activist is that having seen, and having discerned that which is right and just

The Christian will ACT, and act in a fundamental preference that identifies that our goods, our time our lives are a gift to be given freely.

Where will we act?

I want to take as the starting point the first words Francis used in proclaiming the Resurrection this Easter: SLIDE

“What a joy it is for me to announce this message: Christ is risen! I would like it to go out to every house and every family, especially where the suffering is greatest, in hospitals, in prisons …”9

7 There is no cross, big or small, in our life which the Lord does not share with us Pope Francis Twitter 26 th July 20138 An excellent program for our lives: the Beatitudes and Matthew Chapter 25. Pope Francis twitter 21st August 20139 Pope Francis Ubi et Orbi Easter Sunday, 31 March 2013

It was so ordinary where he calls us to proclaim justice, and the love of the risen Christ

Every house

Every family

Especially in hospitals, in prisons…

Are there housing issues in Auckland?10

Are there food, nutrition and breakfasting issues in the schools of Auckland?

Are there employment issues in Auckland? Youth employment, unemployment, ethnic divides in employment, ageism or sexism in employment? 11

Are there issues re the shut in, the elderly and their care in Auckland?

Are there fundamental issues of prisoner care and rehabilitation in Auckland?

Are there life and land issues in Auckland?

The Christians, the students of their schools, the parishioners of their parishes, will be identified by the provision of fundamental ‘love in action’ in these places. SLIDE

Are there issues of poverty in North Auckland?12

Are there issues of employment in North Auckland?

Are there housing issues in North Auckland?

Are there issues of whanau care of the elderly in North Auckland?13

Are there rehabilitation issues for the prisoners of Ngā Wha?

The Christians, the students of their schools, the parishioners of their parishes will be identified by the provision of fundamental ‘love in action’ in these places

Are there issues of poverty in Melanesia and the Pacific, in Palestine and Nepal?

Are there issues of employment in Palestine, Vanuatu, Kiribati?

Are there housing issues and land issues in Bougainville and Tokelau,

Are there issues of elder care and the provision of health and education in Tuvalu and PNG?

10 The problems were the result of a global economic system "that has at its centre an idol called money." Pope Francis11 "Excuse me these are strong words, but I speak the truth," Francis said. "Where there is no work, there is no dignity." Pope Francis12 The measure of the greatness of a society is found in the way it treats those most in need, those who have nothing apart from their poverty. Pope Francis Twitter25th July 201313 We cannot sleep peacefully while babies are dying of hunger and the elderly are without medical assistance. Pope Francis Twitter 17th August 2013

The Christians of Aotearoa New Zealand and the students of their schools and the parishioners of their parishes, will be identified by a willingness to identify and act on the provision of fundamental ‘love in action’ in these places

The call of Francis was so clear and universal:

“the missionary task, that of broadening the boundaries of faith, belongs to every baptized person and all Christian communities; since “the people of God lives in communities, especially in dioceses and parishes, and becomes somehow visible in them, it is up to these to witness Christ before the nations" (Ad Gentes, 37). Each community is therefore challenged, and invited to make its own, the mandate entrusted by Jesus to the Apostles, to be his "witnesses in Jerusalem, throughout Judea and Samaria and to the ends of the earth" (Acts 1:8) and this, not as a secondary aspect of Christian life, but as its essential aspect: we are all invited to walk the streets of the world with our brothers and sisters, proclaiming and witnessing to our faith in Christ and making ourselves heralds of his Gospel.”14

This is the enormity of the issue facing us as Church.

Every time you and I stand at the altar, and say, AMEN to seeing the broken body of Christ, and the one poured out in love of this world, we are saying AMEN, to offering peace, we are saying AMEN to being the body of Christ taken, blessed, broken and given, we are saying AMEN to the final demand of the Mass, “go in peace, to love, and to serve the Lord” and the Lord is found in the least of these my brothers and sisters.15

So what I have tried to do, is not tell you about Caritas, love in action, I have tried to outline that there is a fundamental description of our very being as children of God, as Christ risen, as the baptised, and that it lies in our prayer and our worship, and is the completion of our prayer and our worship.

It is that we are the ones who are willing to open our eyes our ears, our hearts, our hands, and our feet, to the other. We are willing to SEE. And often to SEE anew

It is that we are the ones who are willing to take the time, as a community, to examine, the history, the law, to pray, to hear Gospel, to open our hearts to the words of the prophets and human wisdom: all so that we can JUDGE, rightly

It is that we are the ones who having SEEN and JUDGED are willing to take the little we have, the two loaves of our lives and our being, and let the Lord take them, bless them, break them and give them;

14 Pope Francis MESSAGE OF POPE FRANCIS FOR WORLD MISSION DAY 2013 19 May 2013, Solemnity of Pentecost15 If we wish to follow Christ closely, we cannot choose an easy, quiet life. It will be a demanding life, but full of joy. Pope Francis Twitter 10July

we are the ones who are willing to let the Lord take the small loaf that is you and me, and to take us, bless us, break us, give us; in actions for the least of these my brothers and sisters. We show our love, by ACTION.16

16 The Christian life is not limited to prayer, but requires an on-going dedication and courage born of prayer Pope Francis Twitter 25th July 2013