Word to the Wise
Tuesday, June 7, 2022 - Tuesday in the 10th Week in Ordinary Time
[1 Kgs 17:7-16 and Matt 5:13-16]"You are the salt of the earth. But if salt loses its taste, with what can it be seasoned? It is no longer good for anything but to be thrown out and trampled underfoot. You are the light of the world, A city set on a mountain top cannot be hidden. Nor do they light a lamp and then put it under the bushel basket; it is set on a lampstand, where it gives light to all in the house. Just so, your light must shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your heavenly Father." [Matthew]
From the long Easter journey and reflections on the Gospel According to John, we emerge into Ordinary Time and find ourselves in the Sermon on the Mount in the Gospel According to Matthew! It's a bit like waking from a dream. We are now back in the "ordinary" daily challenge of living the gospel.
The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops issued a document in 1993 entitled Communities of Salt and Light - Reflections on the Social MIssion of the Parish. This document remains a kind of blueprint for what is often called "parish outreach" to neighbors in need. The title is taken from the quote from the Gospel According to Matthew cited above. The aim of the document was and is to call attention to the importance of the parish community in serving the community at large. Jesus' words can be understood by individuals on their own, but they must penetrate the institution of the parish as well.
To understand Jesus' words as reaching beyond individual efforts to community efforts in our culture is to put a finger on one of the defining cultural characteristics of American society - its individualism. This goes back to the roots of our culture, noted in the early 19th century by the traveling French nobleman, Alexis de Toqueville in his classic DEMOCRACY IN AMERICA. It is still being noted in our own time by Robert Bellah's HABITS OF THE HEART. Robert Putnam's BOWLING ALONE is a more recent study. How do we overcome this tendency in order to pool resources beyond the individual level? We can put food in the container in the church vestibule and our donation in the second collection but this still leaves us at a "remove" from the actual hands-on reality of those who will admittedly benefit from our individual generosity. The COVID pandemic makes this question even more neuralgic!
Taking the one small step of joining with others in our parishes to reach out is important. The St. Vincent de Paul Society is a good example of an opportunity in this regard. I serve as chaplain for our local group at our university parish. There may be other ways in which we can raise the consciousness of the entire parish so that the taste of salt and the glimmer of light in Jesus' love can become a community reality. AMEN