Volunteer Missionary Movement (VMM-USA)    |     home

09.12.06  Tuesdays Reflection

"Wherever there are people in need of food and drink, clothing,

housing, medicine, employment, education; wherever people lack the

facilities necessary for living a truly human life, are afflicted

with serious distress or illness, or suffer exile or imprisonment,

there Christian love should seek them out and find them." From

Apostolate of the Laity, quoted in Spirit and Lifestyle.

I think it is significant that Edwina chose this passage from what is

very likely a long document dealing mainly with "churchy" ministry.

If we read through the four gospels, it is evident that Jesus'

message deals primarily with this - the nitty gritty of life - and

our duty to see to it that our neighbor has what he/she needs to live

a truly human life.

The first time I read this passage in preparation for this week's

reflection was the anniversary of Katrina. From New Orleans,

Jennifer Moses in a special article to the Washington Post, wrote: "A

year after Katrina, New Orleanians still waiting: Despite Bush's

promise of $110 billion in aid, reconstruction hasn't yet begun. It

is a source of unending perplexity in Louisiana that so far America

has spent some $320 billion in Iraq for nation-building, whereas in

New Orleans, homeowners have so far seen precisely zero.... Even for

those brave souls who rolled up their sleeves and rebuilt their homes

with sweat equity, a larger problem remains: infrastructure. All but

a handful of public schools are shuttered; the hospitals are so badly

crippled that, in case of emergency, most people assume they'll need

to drive to Baton Rouge; the electric grid is so fragile that regular

power outages are a non-event; and in many parts of town, water lines

still haven't been laid."

Could you imagine Jesus today visiting the poor areas of New Orleans.

I think he would have cried and then he would have condemned today's

scribes and pharisees: those responsible for the "Road Home" program

that hasn't started yet to distribute money to uninsured homeowners

but who, I'm sure, have never failed to collect their pay cheques

over the last year; those who have handled the Federal Emergency

Management Agency money and have awarded more than 70% of its

contracts through a no-bid or limited-bid process; those companies

who accepted government money and did nothing.

Then Jesus would have rolled up his sleeves and worked along side

Habitat for Humanity and sent them a cheque, helped the average Joe

negotiate the mountain of bureaucracy, written and phoned to his

representative in Congress and Senate.

Cecily