"Living Under The Shadows"

I believe that today’s readings provide a strong message for our society today…here in San José. This past week - as in every week - we had a number of people come to the parish for help. A grandmother came in asking for rent support. She’s caring for several of her grandchildren. One of her daughters is in jail and the one living with her now has special needs. Because of her limited resources she was forced to sign two of her oldest grandchildren over to foster care.  A couple weeks ago there was a conflict with the landlord and he evicted this family without warning. He got away with it because the grandmother paid rent in cash and he gave her no receipt. When the eviction came, she had no proof of paying rent.  She’s been living in shabby hotels and in her car with her grandchildren. She can’t get a permanent place because no one will rent a room to a grandmother with four young children and two adults.

Another woman came in looking for help for her family. The family is currently renting in a space in a garage - that is, she’s renting half of a garage. The other half has a family of four! Her daughter is graduating high school and applying for college. Each application costs a minimum of $50. The mother barely makes enough to pay for rent with her $11.00/hour job and she can’t help her college bound daughter.  Once her daughter turns 18, this woman will lose public assistance for her daughter.  This will severely affect the rest of the family. Also it turns out that his woman’s take home pay disqualifies her for getting assistance.  Apparently $11.00/hour is too much money. 

There’s a young 13 year old boy, Pedro or “Peter” as he identifies himself, who wrote about his situation on a social media site, GoFundMe. (See:

http://www.gofundme.com/g2m5q0?fb_action_ids=349110855256528&fb_action_types=og.shares&fb_source=other_multiline&action_object_map=%5B734692109912916%5D&action_type_map=%5B ) This site is a social media site popular with most people who use the internet as a part of school or their job.  Peter tells his story on the website. Once people read his story, they are given the option to donate to help out his family.

Peter helps his single mother raise his sisters and brothers. This past month a massive infestation of roaches and bed bugs have driven all the tenants of his apartment building out of their homes. Peter says that they’ve been living in this situation for over 4 months.  Because of the bedbugs, the children had to get rid of all their clothing, beds and bedding. The exterminators have evacuated or evicted everyone from the building and Peter’s family has until October 31st to get out of their unit.  They won’t get their deposit back because of a change in property management and they are completely broke.  All their belongings are in backpacks.  Five backpacks. 

Peter wrote on his GoFundMe webpage, “My mom has worked so hard over the last few weeks to try to find us a new place and come up with the money for the first month of rent and deposit on a new apartment.  She is even taking on a second job.  With 5 kids and being a single mom, this is just too much for her.” I was blown away by Peter’s initiative in getting this GoFundMe account.  Peter, his mom and siblings have their story for sure, but their story and the story of the grandmother and the single mother isn’t unique.  They are, we are, the untold story of Silicon Valley. If our stories aren’t told, the truth remains in the shadow. When our stories are known, we are known: we are no longer hidden in the shadows.

We are the workers behind the scenes. We clean up their offices after they go home to their spacious homes.  We stand behind the counter serving them coffee and scones and we come by their tables to wipe up the messes their children left behind. We work behind the scenes as construction workers, gardeners, nanny’s, care takers, and hotel workers. No one sees our face, they look at our badge or our uniform.  If they even use our name, they mispronounce it. Mostly they call us, “hey you” or “Miss” or “Excuse me!”  We make $11.00 an hour. We live with 10 other people who are not our relatives in a crowded duplex in a neighborhood that is not entirely safe. We live in the shadows because no one knows our story.

When working folks are forced to live in their cars, or behind dumpsters in a shopping mall or church, or rent cheap hotel rooms week to week because they can’t pay for groceries and rent - they are living in captivity. There’s a Facebook meme that I came across that captures this point, “When the entirety of your earnings are exhausted on food and shelter, your labors are no longer viewed as an opportunity for economic advancement, but rather as an act of self preservation. In the real world that’s called SLAVERY.”

The Exodus reading speaks about this injustice in no uncertain terms. Let’s revisit some of those verses, “You shall not molest or oppress an immigrant, for you were once slaves in the land of Egypt…You shall not wrong any widow or orphan….If you lend money to one of your poor neighbors…you shall not act like an extortioner toward him by demanding interest from him. If you take your neighbor's cloak as a pledge…you shall return it to him before sunset."

Today when we read Exodus, we, like the Jewish people, cannot forget that at one time we were - if not now - are or were immigrant slaves. There are some immigrants who have done very well - they start technology companies, grocery store chains, cleaning services, construction companies!  But there are many more who have not done so well. 

This brings us to the task that I believe we all have to face: how to deal with those who live in the shadows. Sure, our story is sad - it’s tough to hear and there are no easy solutions, but what we face isn’t hopelessness. Our story is  ultimately a story of resilience and resistance. We, like the Hebrew people, will not be slaves forever.  We will overcome. We will overcome just as that grandmother is overcoming her obstacles by reaching out and finding support. Like that the daughter of the single mother who is living in one half of a garage and applying for college hoping to help out her family by getting a college degree. Like 13 year old Peter, whose faith in his mother makes him hopeful, innovative, and creative rather than resentful and dejected.

Jesus reminds us that the love of God is inseparable from the love of neighbor. If we are neighbors, no one lives in the shadows. No one is a slave. If we love our neighbor, we will find hope in one another and find hope in the midst of struggle. We will find the strength to take just one more step. Love will give us joy even if it looks like there’s not a lot to be joyful for. And when we’re joyful, we have the confidence to believe that we have something to offer, not just to ourselves, but to our neighbor.

So in love, we come before Christ to this altar, bringing the gifts born of our struggle. We bear the gifts of our lives - trusting that what we surrender unto God will bear fruit in someone else. And in return, we trust that what we receive from this altar - the Body and Blood of Christ - will be enough for us.

St. Ignatius’ prayer, the Suscipe

Take, Lord, and receive all my liberty,
my memory, my understanding,
and my entire will,
All I have and call my own.

You have given all to me.
To you, Lord, I return it.

Everything is yours; do with it what you will.
Give me only your love and your grace,
that is enough for me.

Open Our Eyes

Not too long ago I was in a store with a group of friends who aren’t exactly on the same page as me about social justice. We talked about the price of food - they were complaining - and I responded to their complaints that a lot went into the food that we were buying. I asked them if they ever stopped along the freeway to look at the kind of work that farmworkers do - that is, what it takes to put strawberries into boxes, watermelons into trucks, stooping down to cut lettuce and asparagus and going through the vineyard pushing through the branches and leaves to cut grapes. No one had. I shared how the food was packaged and put into trucks to be sent to processing centers for sale and distribution. Still not convinced about the so-called “food chain,” I told them about my own mother who put herself through business school by working as a cannery worker. This changed the conversation.  I discovered I needed to make a connection with them that was real. I needed to connect the story of the individual with the the systemic mess of injustice. People had to “see” the suffering to come to a conversion point.

Jesus opens our eyes not only the suffering of the farmworker that suffers from heat stroke, but he opens our eyes to the entire system that makes farmworkers work long, hard hours in 110 degree weather in the Imperial Valley.  We must open our eyes to the realities of a 16 year old Oaxacan fieldworker in Greenfield, a 10 year old child making Michael Jordan shoes in Viet Nam, a young woman locked in a factory in rural China assembling iPhones. In today’s Gospel, Jesus is opening the eyes of the Jerusalem Pharisees by making the point when he holds up the coin that everyone is caught up in the web of Cesar and his unjust system.  But we all have to make a choice once we see the injustice.  When the Pharisees admit that they personally benefit from an economic and social system that is sustained by labor coerced by force and economic realities that make people essentially slaves, they will have to make choice about how they will continue living their lives knowing that their well-being is possible at the expense of invisible people who undoubtedly suffer much.

What Jesus sees at stake in the matter of the coin is not a matter of the separation of Church and State.  Jesus is arguing that one cannot continue on living one’s life without taking a serious look at what makes your life possible. He is trying to uncover the violence underneath every day life in Jerusalem.  To understand this point, we have to understand where Jesus came from.

Before Jesus and Pontius Pilate were born, the Roman conquerers flooded the markets with Roman money as a way to coerce the people into depending more on the Roman system. Putting Roman coins in the hands of a conquered people was the way that Rome maintained social and political control.   At the time around Jesus’ birth the Romans instituted a census tax. This tax was not well received and a rebellion began.  In Galilee there were a few insurgents that led the rebellion, but they were crucified.  When Jesus was a teen, a rebel, Judas of Galilee, cried out, “Taxation was no better than an introduction to slavery!” Romans were cruel in their counter-attacks. Galilee became known as a hotbed of political unrest. (see http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/religion/portrait/galilee.html and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judas_of_Galilee)  Jesus’ background as a child and youth was formed in the rebellious environment of Galilee. It is therefore not a surprise that Jesus was willing to take on a good fight.

Jesus tried to open the eyes of the Pharisees. They knew what Jesus knew, they just didn’t want to open their eyes.  In fact, everybody knew that the system was corrupt and people were hurting because of this system. Jesus the Galilean was not going to let it go. Jesus’ preaching was dangerous because Jesus taught that there was only one legitimate Kingdom: that of God.  All other principalities - including Cesar’s, were false and illegitimate.

The Jerusalem Pharisees and the Sadducees, Scribes, Temple Priests and all other powerful people in Jerusalem realized that if Jesus were to continue his preaching and bringing together all sorts of people a across gender, economic and social lines, Pilate would understand these assemblies and speech as rebellion and he would be forced to address this rebellion with swift action. The power brokers of Jerusalem were coming to the conclusion that the brutality of Pilate’s response would be too harmful to the people. Ultimately their treacherous actions were guided by the principle that it be better than one man die, then suffer the entire community. They were willing to tolerate injustice in order to keep on living  the way they were. 

Jesus wanted more than anything to free those who were trapped by the system. He believed that challenging people and getting them to question the things all around them would give the the idea that they could be free and they did not have to be victims of their own oppression. The awareness of the very possibility of liberation is HOPE. Jesus called them to join his cause and to unshackle themselves of their fears.  He gave them a way out. Regrettably, the vision of freedom made his detractors only more defensive. They couldn't get on board with Jesus’ message of HOPE built on liberation and resistance. It was far easier just to accuse Jesus of blasphemy.

This Gospel is very important for us today.  Jesus knew the Kingdom of God is about creating justice for those who have been left out of the picture. The Kingdom is about the 100%, not the 1%. In trying to open the Pharisee’s eyes, he asked someone to produce a coin. One of the Pharisees gave the coin to Jesus. This simple act of producing a coin exposed the first level of hypocrisy. Jesus knew that these guys were with him in his critique of the Romans. The Pharisee had an unclean object in his pocket.  The image on the coin and the pagan symbols made everything unclean.  Carrying a profane object by the Temple, the most sacred space in Israel, was a significant offense. Jesus continued to probe the hypocrisy. He pointed out the image on the coin - the image is Cesar.  The Pharisee’s coin represented the entire system of oppression and coerced peace. This coin was, in effect, an instrument of the Jewish people’s oppression.  Jesus exposed the sad reality that his entire society was unwittingly participating in a fundamentally evil system. The coin didn't belong to the people, in fact, the coin belonged to Cesar and everything he stood for: a society controlled by the constant threat of crucifixion, a class-conscious society that excluded entire segments of society from participation, a society that rewarded the strong and punished the weak. Cesar was owned nothing.

We too have coins in our pocket.  Our national interests are protected by our troops invading lands with oil, by policies that  opened borders to lure workers in, but sealed the borders behind them to make them slaves. Our national interests are protected by investing resources in bailing out Wall Street and crooked companies and investors, while ignoring the millions of people displaced by foreclosure. We cannot have it both ways. We either serve God or we serve Cesar. We either serve the 100% or the 1%. 

In a few chapters Jesus will indeed have a confrontation with Pilate and this confrontation will come at a cost.  Jesus died so that we could rise. And that we are risen by virtue of our baptism means that we too, rebels of Galilee, will take up the cross of resistance and hope!  

I can do all things in him who strengthens me.

In every circumstance and in all things I have learned the secret of being well fed and of going hungry, of living in abundance and of being in need.  I can do all things in him who strengthens me.

I love that line, “I can do all things in him who strengthens me.” This past week the priests of the diocese had a retreat with Fr. Greg Boyle (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greg_Boyle), of Homeboy Industries - a re-entry training and employment program helping ex-felons and gang members leave their old lives behind.  Fr Boyle, or as he is known on the streets as, “G,”  told stories of how homies from “East Los” moved from the life on the streets to getting jobs, training, and getting on with life. The stories of these men and women is captured in the line, (“I can do all things in him who strengthens me.”).  Our retreat with G helped us understand that the “homies” are our kin.  His homies are not distant people disconnected from us; they are literally our sons and daughters, our sisters and brothers, our flesh and blood.

G’s stories served one central theme for our retreat: that when we find kinship with others, we will find kinship with God within our selves.  This interior kinship with God is something that cannot be taken away or forgotten. It is something that changes us for ever. Like a tattoo on the heart.

When G went to Dolores Mission, he started out ministering with the idea that intervention would save the people in the community. After having worked at the Mission for several years, he came to the conclusion that salvation is not about saving people from themselves, but having people be restored to themselves. He had to come to understand that salvation is about seeing ourselves as God sees us and ministry as the opportunity in which people find their way back to their true self.

G is one of the best storytellers I know. He told stories about gang members who entered into Homeboy Industries right out of prison had their life changed by the Homeboys program. One one side the program is practical: participants achieve stability and acquire new skills - but the real change happens when participants make a heart-connection to former enemies, to staff and most significantly, with themselves.

When people connect with themselves they begin to see themselves in a much more gentle, graceful way.  He told the story about a young man who was covered head to toe in tattoos who went into the Men’s Warehouse to buy a new suit because that man, G and a couple other homies were going to DC to meet the president in the White House. G brought the young men to the store to buy suits for the occasion. When this one guy came out of the dressing room and stood in front of the mirror, he saw himself as if it were for the first time. 

The way that G told the story, the young man saw something that he hadn’t noticed earlier in his life.  Standing at the mirror, looking at his reflection in silence, the young man for the first time saw the real person who dwelt inside him.  This hard-nosed gang member covered in tattoos and scars from old scuffles, realized that he wasn’t just ink and old wounds. He was much more.  He realized at the most intimate level of his life that he was a someBody. He wasn’t just a gang-banger, a former hoodlum or criminal. He was God’s beautiful child. The veil of self-deception that would have led to his death fell away. 

On this mountain he will destroy the veil that veils all peoples, the web that is woven over all nations; he will destroy death forever.

This young man had to come to a reckoning with himself. While his fingers touched his tattoos and old scars as he stood in front of that mirror, he knew that he couldn’t just erase the past. He had to make peace with the past. When we reconcile within ourselves, our kinship to God becomes ever more powerful. Kinship with others and self-acceptance makes us experience God in a real, concrete, tangible, visceral way. God isn’t a distant concept or theological construct.  God is a real force of healing and confidence.

The Lord GOD will wipe away the tears from every face; the reproach of his people he will remove from the whole earth; for the LORD has spoken. …This is the LORD for whom we looked; let us rejoice and be glad that he has saved us!” For the hand of the LORD will rest on this mountain.

When any of us see ourselves in a gentle, loving way, we see ourselves as God sees us and when that happens we start living differently than our old way of life.  While transformation is possible, it is not an easy task. Jesus said, “Many are invited, but few are chosen.” Transformation happens when we find kinship rather than enmity, when we find resolution rather than conflict. When we find forgiveness rather than resentment and love rather than separation.

The homies who’d been given the opportunity to go to the White House, had been living their lives differently, but they still lacked one thing. They needed to see themselves differently. The last part of their transformation was self-realization - standing in front of the mirror, wearing a suit, saying, “Damn, I am someBODY.” The suit was just a simple outward sign of the inward change.   Today they don’t need the suit. They have faith.

One day we too will be invited to show our inner self to another person. One day we will stand in front of a mirror - maybe a real mirror or a spiritual mirror and look at our reflection and ask, “What do I see?”

When we come to this Table, we have been invited to a banquet of kinship. The point of our Eucharistic banquet is to share in the one cup and the one bread as an outward sign of what we are feeling on the inside: kinship, connection, a bond with our sisters and brothers. The host in the parable kicked out the guest who wasn’t wearing a wedding garment. The guy wasn’t tossed out because he couldn’t afford garments, he was tossed out because he didn’t see the point of connecting to the event, to the groom nor to the host. So, like the host at the wedding feast who expected his guests to adorn themselves with a wedding garment that expressed honor and support for the families of the newlyweds, we too will be asked to put on the garment of kinship as we come to this banquet.

It is my hope that as we come forward, we have prepared ourselves to share in this banquet now. 

To Act justly, to love mercy and walk humbly with our God.

The passage today from Isaiah is a tough one. Like Jesus’ parable, it deals with corruption. Isaiah’s passage deals with the corruption of the institution whereas Jesus’ parable deals with the corruption of people within the institution. Isaiah’s passage and Jesus parable aren't about other people. It’s about all of us and how corruption enters into the vineyard and how each of us consciously or unconsciously participates in that corruption.

Religion and churches don’t start out corrupt, but, history has shown over time that churches, synagogues, mosques and temples inevitably have to deal with bad grapes. What causes a bad harvest? What causes corruption in the institution?  How is it that good people do bad things? 

Corruption enters the vineyard when people seek ways to damage, hurt destroy and eventually kill anyone or anything that would threaten their power base.  Group behavior like this is not surprising if we look at the behavior of spousal abusers. When an abusive spouse feels that he or she has lost their grip on their victim, they become even more cruel.  Abusers will attack not only their victims but also helpers.  They may even claim that they themselves are the real victims. 

Isaiah’s “Song of the Vineyard” starts out with establishing that the owner of the vineyard had given everything to build up his vineyard. Clearing the desert land of rocks and putting up a watchtower indicates that the owner is clearly interested in a return for his investment. Grapes require patience because they don’t come up fast like wheat or corn. After years of tilling the the soil and trimming the vine, the vineyard will produce a proper harvest. Workers must be dedicated to the crop and successful vineyard owners must treat their vineyard as a long-term investment and not just a job. Vineyard owner and worker must cooperate with one another in order to produce grapes. The owner must treat the workers justly and the workers must realize that they must do their job, not the owner’s job.

In the Middle East grapes were an important crop - they would become wine which would provide some nourishment in the desert and raisins for food in times of hunger. If wild grapes were all that were produced, the effort of the owner would have been in vain.  In the original Hebrew, it is very clear that the word for wild grapes is equated with that of a “bitter harvest.” Poorly aerated soil and poorly grafted vines will result in wild or bitter grapes.  The word, “bitter harvest” is also used in the Bible to reference a harvest of injustice and repression.  Thus, this particular song reminds us that the sweet harvest requires that all of us do our jobs in the vineyard, being attentive to the task at hand. God’s intent is not that we yield a bitter harvest of injustice and repression because of neglect, but that we yield a harvest of love, compassion and mercy because of fidelity.

In Jesus’ parable another dimension is added. Jesus addressed the motivations of those who do violence. In Jesus’ parable the workers in the vineyard thought that they were the owners and that because they worked in the vineyard, they deserved the full harvest.  Now, let’s go back Isaiah’s song. The workers of the vineyard aren't the owners. The vineyards’ workers didn't invest in the vineyard nor did they place themselves at risk for the harvest…yet they demanded control of the harvest…and they were ready to kill to take control.

Earlier this year, the parable of the Vineyard came up in a daily mass reading. The Pope asked, “What happens when we want to become the owners of the vineyard?”He continued saying that those who want “to take possession of the vineyard…have lost the relationship with the Master of the vineyard.” Those who would take possession of the vineyard, “think they are strong, they think they are independent of God.” In effect, the usurpers have severed themselves from the loving and patient intentions of the owner of the vineyard.  He said, “They have become worshippers of themselves.” (http://www.news.va/en/news/pope-francis-the-corrupt-harm-the-church-the-saint)  When the owner’s Son arrived, were they grateful to hand him over the harvest or were they resentful?

A bitter harvest can happen in the offices of the Vatican or any given parish in the world. When our theology, preaching and actions make people dependent on US rather than dependent on God, we will for sure yield a bitter harvest.  Sure we can preach about Jesus. We can utter his name a thousands times, but if the recitation of his name and our words engender fear in people rather than make them confident in God’s power, we are doing something horribly wrong. I believe in the attempts Pope Francis is making to change the Church from being a dogmatic, self-engrossed institution to being a gentle, outreaching, compassionate presence in the world. That change won’t happen by fiat or command from the top, but because priests and local bishops are doing what they can to be more concerned about the well-being of others more than being concerned with self-preservation.

When we put ourselves in the center rather than the one died for our sins, we do no service to anyone. If our words and deeds do not reflect grace and forgiveness, then who is being served?  By preaching about fear and the terror of the unknown, all we do is make people dependent on us, not God. Grace, on the other hand, always points back to God. Preaching forgiveness always leads to community.   When we have community we have the possibility for open-mindedness and when there is open-mindedness, we have the possibility for service to others.  As workers we are obligated to be sure the vineyard is doing what it’s supposed to do: produce good grapes of righteousness and justice.

The story of the vineyard in both Isaiah and Jesus’ parable - reminds us that everything we have is due to God’s GRACE, not our merits. We have been entrusted with an opportunity that we are called upon to care for: the vineyard.  We are called to share the bounty of the vineyard with everyone - that no one hunger or thirst. As JOYFUL workers in the vineyard, we do not use the tools of fear and repression scaring people with hell or being captured by the clutches of the devil. We, above all, are joyful. Christianity is about GOOD news, not threats or spiritual torture. 

So… we come to this Table with a spirit of thanksgiving. We are extremely aware that the Eucharistic Harvest belongs to Christ, not us. We are at best, workers in the vineyard - not the owners - and all we are doing is what we were called to do in the first place: To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with our God.