Twenty Third Sunday in Ordinary Time B. Ministry Sunday.  September 10, 2006.  7:30, 11:30, 6PM.  Isaiah 35: 4-7a. James 2: 1-5. Mark 7: 31-37.

One school day last year a fourth grader appeared in the parish office and told the receptionist that he had a problem and needed to talk to Fr. Bob.  When he came into my office he was completely absorbed by the big chair in which I invited him to sit.  He then began to unfold a story that was causing him much pain.  I was very moved by the boy, not just because his story was sad and painful, but also because he trusted me with his pain.  He didn’t feel that he was too little or unimportant or that I was too busy or too big to talk to him. 

A few days ago I was called out of a meeting to talk to a woman who insisted on talking to a priest.  As many times happens, I was sure that the woman was looking for money.  She told me that she had run out of a prescription and that she wouldn’t have the money for the medicine until her check came in four days.  As I was beginning to tell myself that I have heard this phony story before the woman began to cry.  She told me that she had run out of her medicine for depression and anxiety.  She said that I would not be able to understand how miserable the next three nights would be without the medicine.  She said that all she wanted me to do was to call the pharmacy where she had just been and ask them to give her the medicine.  She wanted my help and not my money. I am very glad that I listened to her and did not turn her away.  Yes, I have been taken advantage of at times in the past, but I need to remember that the poor have the ear of God and a very special place in God’s heart. 

The Letter of James says: “If a man with gold rings and fine clothes comes into your assembly, and a poor person in shabby clothes also comes in, and you pay attention to the one wearing the fine clothes and say, ‘Sit here, please,’ while you say to the poor one, ‘stand there, or you can sit at my feet,’ have you not made distinctions among yourselves and become judges with evil designs?” 

The city of Rome is filled with beggars.  For some of them begging is a way of life, but not for all of them.  I remember seeing a poor woman, a bag lady, in church day after day.  My first impression was that she was keeping warm during the rainy winter season in Rome.  When I took time to talk with her I found out that she understood the writings of the great mystics St. John of the Cross and St. Theresa of Avila.  I was at the University studying these great masters of spirituality and this poor bag lady was in church engaged in a profound life of prayer.  The Letter of James goes on to say, “Listen my beloved brothers and sisters.  Did not God choose those who are poor in the world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom that he promised to those who love him?”

Jesus often touched the blind and the crippled, the deaf and the ignorant with his healing love.  In fact, love for those in need is one of the principle signs of God’s kingdom in our midst.   Jesus came to us as a poor baby in the manger in Bethlehem.  He saved us as a poor condemned man on the Cross.  Those who can not find Christ and serve Christ in those in need will probably not find him at all.

The many ministries of this parish community invite us to bring Christ’s healing power to the needy in the inner city of Minneapolis to far away Ghana, West Africa, and to the neediness of each one of us in this parish community.   Ministry is about reaching out to one another and touching one another with the healing power of Jesus Christ.  When we care for one another we love Jesus and worship Jesus.  We also prepare for the Day of Judgment when Jesus will say to each of us, “Whatever you did for the least of my brothers and sisters you did for me.”