Collateral Damage

Everything we do affects someone else, and it is usually the poor who suffer the most from the indifference and even hostility of others.

Some say that the poor in Texas would be the rich elsewhere. Here it is often the case that even the poor have TVs and the latest cell phones. It is easy to invent images of the rich being awful people, but very few of them really are. Our relationship with money is just a thing that has and will change with time; sometimes we are poorer, sometimes we are richer.

But our children are much worse off than we were. Again and again the safety nets are disappearing, even for those who work. Such perks as pensions, free insurance, full time work and job security have virtually disappeared. Reasonable work expectations have disappeared because the insistence on an ever higher bottom line to satisfy stock holders. The price of a housing has risen to shocking heights.

How much of this is the result of the low value our society places on human life. When noncombatants are killed in war; when people cannot live on one income, when going to a hospital more and more is placing your life at risk, what definition can we give to collateral damage.

by Laura Weston, widow of Deacon Michael

IF YOU LIKE, READ ALONG AS YOU LISTEN:

I'm going to speak in generalities today, trying to make specific points with regard to Islam.

We are not talking about a large percentage of the people in Islam that are a problem. It is a very small percentage. But you have to keep in mind that in World War I with the Russian Revolution, it wasn't a revolution of a majority of people. That in the 1920s Adolf Hitler probably had the support of maybe 5% of the population of Germany at best and was elected Chancellor with thirty-some percent. It is not the majority that can be the source of problems.

But you can see where if there is going to be an approach that causes problems, especially for us in the Western world, that basically takes a different world view, how the readings that we have today are very much emblematic of both Christianity, but because of the impact of Christianity of Western society, for Western Society itself.

So we talk about, in the context of ancient Judaism: good things happen to good people; bad things happen to bad people.

Jesus turns that on its head, totally. That is not something that you find in every other religion. It is unique to basically say, "You who are pathetic, you who have problems are, in fact, the blessed. To the contrary, if you believe in a particular religion, you believe you are going to be better than everybody else. Good things are going to happen to you.

So you end up with the fundamental conflict. We see the wonderful impact of this approach... let's put it in the context of war, in the context of collateral damage.

To us it was morally almost beyond comprehension that someone would want to kill a bunch of civilians by crashing airplanes into buildings. We work a great deal in the United States, and in Western Europe, too, I'm sure, on developing weapons where I can shoot Bob and have no impact on Beth whatsoever, because Beth would be collateral damage. It is something that is a Christian perspective.

The other Christian perspective is what St. Paul is taking about. "Put to death then, the parts of you that are earthly: immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and the greed that is idolatry. To take away anger, fury, malice, slander, obscene language." To change the way you are by being Christian. To adopt a certain passivity in the way that we approach the world.

And then St. Luke particularly has his beatitudes, his "blessed"s. And he starts out with one of the ones that are the most controversial of all, even in the Gospels themselves they are controversial.

"Blessed are you who are poor." Matthew and Mark say, "Blessed are you are are poor in spirit." There's a difference.

St. Luke is unequivocal. "Blessed are the poor." So let's take the financial statements of every one of you in this room. And we're going to separate. We're going to go fifty fifty. Fifty percent don't qualify as poor. Fifty percent poor: they're blessed, according to the teachings of Christ.

They who are hungry, who are suffering, they're weeping, they're mourning, they are being persecuted, are the blessed. What does "blessed" mean? They're further down the path to spend all eternity with God in Heaven than the rich, who have received their consolation.

If you're hungry, you will be blessed. All of these things are looked on as blessed. We have great saints from the very beginning. They come in, they have great wealth, they give away all their wealth to the poor. Think of Francis of Assisi.

They sell what they have. They relinquish everything for God. That is a great aspiration in Christianity: to give to the poor, to take care of the suffering, to take care of the mourning. But when that society that is basically, whether it recognizes it or not, based on the fundamental premise that the world is made to bring better things to everyone runs across a society that does not have the same premise, then you're going to have a clash.

That is part of what we are looking at in the world that we are living in now and the world that is going to be around for quite a while. That is the reality. But from our perspective... and I always have to bring it back from the macro to the micro... on an individual basis... and this is a problem that is very, very difficult, and it is not easy, and there is some consolation in the fact that there are saints who died rich, now I'm not sure how they accomplished it in light of the reading we have today... but what is it when we look at our world, and we look at ourselves, and we look in our wallets, and we have something there, there's something in our wallet, am I taking care of the poor? Am I following the precedential option for they poor?

If I look and say… eh… here's a good example. As a deacon, I know Don Zimmerman, who's the pastor over at Christ the Rich, uh, Christ the King. I could probably call Don and say, "I would like to transfer to Christ the King because I feel comfortable around rich people, and I'm kinda hoping some of that richness will rub off. Or do I go to a place like St. Augustine, which I did for a while, where the people are poor. There is no question. They walk in the door and you know that they are poor.

What is our obligation?

Mary Immaculate is an interesting one for me because you guys are not poor. Very few of you are rich. The wonder of Mary Immaculate to me is that diversity. The incredible diversity we have in this church. Any given Sunday Mass we are going to see someone at Mass from every continent in the world except for Antarctica, and maybe even sometimes them. That when you walk in the door all of a sudden there are three people talking to you. You're not going to leave Mass without someone talking to you. "Oh you're new here, how are you doing. My name is blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Welcome to Mary Immaculate." That's Mary Immaculate. That is the personification of Mary Immaculate.

That is in accordance with looking at people as being blessed in the reality of their existence. That is the fundamental reason I love Mary Immaculate. I hate to tell you. Jeff, Robert, Margene, I love you guys, but you're not the reason I love Mary Immaculate. I love the people of Mary Immaculate. No question about it.

But the reality is that if you look at that personification of the world that comes through Jesus Christ and you run across people who don't believe in it, there's going to be a clash.

Jeff goes and he lives in a world... computer programmers are wild people. They go out whenever they can and drink. They go to strip clubs. They're loud. They're obnoxious. They're in your face. And they will do anything for a buck.

Now those of you who are really listening, you know I was talking about the legal profession instead of computer programmers, (laughter) but there is going to be a clash.

That's the reality of the world. And that comes... but worse than that... we'll come back to the computer programmers being like lawyers... what do I have to do with somebody like him who is so different from me?

I have a very full head of hair, he doesn't. I'm not telling the truth. What do you do with that clash? What do you do with that clash?

Hummmm. Jeff, I love you. You are my neighbor. I love you. Jeff, I understand that in the reality of your great wealth and obnoxiousness, you have a need. You have a need.

So in the reality of our existence, no matter how wealthy we are, healthy, wealthy and wise, all of those things, the reality is that in our existence, he has a poverty that gives him a preference if he chooses to accept it, and places an obligation on me to help him. The obligation is there.

I’m not sure what Jeff’s poverty… well, I know what Jeff’s poverty is but I can’t say it in public.

That's the reality of Christianity. St. Luke, Jesus: blessed are the poor, blessed are the hungry, blessed are the weeping, blessed are you if people hate you.

Guess what? Every one of you falls into that category. Every one of you. Every one of us. Again it's an example of how we have to approach the world as Christians of loving our neighbor. Because not only do we have to love our neighbor, even the obnoxious ones. If we truly knew who they were as Christ knows who they are, we know that there is something special about them that we have an obligation to take care of them, because again,with St. Matthew, the separating of the sheep and goats, those who took care of the least. Guess what, Jeff for all his actions being like a lawyer, is one of the least.

And again, going back to the struggle of the clash of civilizations… when that perspective hits, tap, tap, tap, tap, another civilization that does not have the same belief, there is going to be conflict. And one of the things that is most striking in the conflict between Christianity, the Western world, and Islam, at this point particularly, is the fact that what I described before, if I want to destroy Robert and I destroy Beth, then she is unacceptable collateral damage.

They don't have that same perspective of the world. So when we look at Islam as being a problem, it's a very small part of the society that is that way. They are radical, and they are acting contrary to natural law because whether they're Islam or they are Catholic, within their hearts is natural law. And part of the repugnancy that the vast majority of the people in the world have is you don't hurt the innocent.

There is a radical group that doesn't have that problem and that's the source. It isn't Islam, its that group within Islam that's causing us so much trouble.

And how do we approach them? This is the one you're going to love the best: they're our neighbor. Because unquestionably with that set of beliefs they are in need and they are the poor to be taken care of.

September 4, 2019 2