Blessed are the poor

“What I love about the ministry of Jesus is that he identified the poor as blessed and the rich as needy...and then he went and ministered to them both. This, I think, is the difference between charity and justice. Justice means moving beyond the dichotomy between those who need and those who supply and confronting the frightening and beautiful reality that we desperately need one another.”

                                Rachel Held Evans

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the First Church of Mutual Need

now THAT

would be a great name for a church

for the fact is we all have needs

and we all need each other

we do of course all have different needs

and we all have different things we can offer one another

but like it our not

convenient or not

we are all in this together

and if there is a hierarchy of needs

it is a reverse hierarchy

those we think are the neediest are the most blessed

and those we think are the most blessed are the neediest

now that will make your mind explode

the rich are perhaps the neediest of all

think about their compulsive need for more

and about how difficult it is for them to share

(the rich give proportional much less to charity than the poor)

and I suspect, how difficult it is for them to connect with others

to feel, to have empathy

the poor?

we can’t sugarcoat things, and create some sort of caricature of the blessed poor

being poor sucks, big time

insecurity, struggles with housing, transportation, food security, healthcare, education, and all the rest

no one wants to be poor

no one should be poor

and that is partly the point

Jesus advocated the rich opening their hands

In the early church, apparently, they did (Acts 2)

and everyone’s needs were met

the need of the rich to learn generosity, and experience the

joy of giving, and then need of the poor for food

of course we live in a country with extreme and growing inequity

the rich are really rich, the poor are really poor

and the gap between the two is growing

and it is devastating

the entire system is designed to keep the poor poor and make the rich richer

and it is done, often, in the name of Jesus (which is blasphemy)

and now we have Covid-19

and we are living out our failure to take care of each other

we have protected the stock market, but not the poor

we have protected the rich, but not the poor

and that is why we are in pain, around choices related to

opening or safety

and why people are literally willing to let people die for the economy

if we had more equity

if our response to the virus was to take care of everyone

I suspect the dialog would be different

The questions would be different

Is suspect this would all feel different

What if, instead of asking

How can we open our country so that businesses and people can pay their bills?

We asked “how can we help businesses and people pay their bills so they can stay safe?

Perhaps instead of ending up in armed (literally) camps

With the “open” folks on one side and the “safety” folks on the other

With both sides shaming and condemning each other

We would be working together to find solutions

Finding ways to take care of everyone, as they have need

I realize there are no easy answers

But it seems that one answer is to change the starting point

From taking care of “me”

To taking care of “all”

Welcome to the First Church of the Needy

(which might end up being First Church of the Joyful Givers)