Who Can We Trust?

We all want to be the hero in our own story. When things go bad, we want to be seen as the solution, not the problem.

In a continuation of his sermon from the day before, in this sermon Michael brings his love of history into his analysis of what makes a saint, or more particularly what makes a martyr. A martyr is a scapegoat.

Sometimes we need to find someone or something to blame for our troubles. We even create that someone or something. The Jews sacrificed a scapegoat, which was an actual goat, every year on the Day of Atonement. The scapegoat took on the sins of the people and was sacrificed to remove those sins from the community so that everyone could start anew with a clean slate.

That wasn’t so good for the goat, and it is not so good for the people who become scapegoats.

written by Laura Weston, widow of Deacon Michael

IF YOU LIKE, READ ALONG WHILE YOU ARE LISTENING:

One thing to always remember, I always say this when we have it, when Jesus or anybody in the Old Testament goes up a mountain, something really important is going to happen.  And here we have "go out to all nations and baptize them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit."

We have today Paul Miki and companions who were in the late 16th century Japan.  The Jesuits had come into Japan.  They were meeting with a great deal of success.  And then the man who ruled in the name of the emperor decided they wanted the Jesuits out, Paul Miki, was a native Japanese who had become a Jesuit, and they were executed. 

So we have them as martyrs.  Again it brings back the question of martyrdom and I was talking yesterday with regard to St. Agatha.  We have a situation where it's the interface between religious life and secular life, the rulers of the country.  And this is something that is a very important thing.

Now, to go back on the story of St. Agatha, why was, at this period of time, this was in the late third century, the Catholics, the Christians, maybe were half of the population of Rome.  They were growing significantly.  They were totally acceptable.  And all of a sudden the Roman emperor decided he wanted to persecute the Catholics.  What happened?

Well, a lot of it has to do with how you became the Roman emperor.  Basically very few Roman emperors were not overthrown.  They were not like we envision a family that was ruling for, centuries even, it was something where they were put in by the army because they got tired of the old emperor or whatever.  Decius was one of those.  And it is thought that he needed to have a scapegoat, politically, to have more support. 

What happened to Paul Miki and his companions?  The Church was doing well, but the rulers of the country were a little nervous about the Catholics.  They were very nervous about Westerners.  And the triggering event that led to this persecution was the fact that, I believe it was the Dutch, sent a ship to Japan and on that ship were artillery.  They had cannons.

The Japanese did not have the technology. They didn't have guns.  They couldn't do anything against the artillery and they were afraid of the Westerners.  They were very insular.  So what do you do?  You get rid of them, exemplified by the Catholics.

That is a place in which martyrs are made.

I'll give you a couple of examples that are relevant to our situation today.  In the American election of 1876, it was a tie.  Literally a tie.  Not only in votes, but in Congress.  Everybody didn't know what they were doing.  Finally, Samuel Tilton was a candidate for the Democrat Party… they reached a deal… and the deal was that the Republican, Rutherford B. Hayes, you've heard of him, became president, and Reconstruction stopped.

That was the genesis of the Jim Crow laws in the United States.  That was the genesis of the legalizing the discrimination, and the lynching many times, of blacks in the South.

Another example was in the 1912 election of Woodrow Wilson against Alfred Smith.  Alfred Smith was Catholic.  At that point in time the Democrat party allied themselves with the Ku Klux Klan among others, because one of the positions was: they don't like Catholics.  So they ended up in a situation where civil rights generally, but specifically again against blacks, were changed.  All of their situations became a lot different.  That's where, I think Frank remembers the expression, the "yellow dog" Democrats.  A yellow dog Democrat in the South was someone who would vote for anybody; he would vote for a yellow dog before he would ever vote for a Republican.

So what is underlying those situations because as we know in the United States, we know in the Roman Empire, and we know with the Japanese empire, what causes the secular to turn?  First it is a threat to power.  And so they react and they look to the scapegoat.  Who is the scapegoat?  The scapegoat is someone that you can get political power with because nobody likes them anyway.  Nobody likes the Catholics.  Nobody likes the blacks.  Nobody likes... fill it in… the Westerners, whatever.  And so you have a situation that develops where the man who ruled in the name of the emperor is feeling uncomfortable and says, "We've got to get rid of those Westerners and we especially have to get rid of Catholics, especially Japanese Catholics because they are subversive."

What does that do to what Jesus is telling us in the gospel?  He says, "baptize them, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you." That fundamentally violates what Jesus commanded us to do, because what Jesus commanded us to do is to love our neighbor.  So you get into a situation that for the purpose of secular rule they have a perceived, or they need to create, a perceived threat.  Who do you do it against?  You do it against the very people who you can create the image of "them."

Again, it's are we "them," or are we "us?"  Do we love our neighbor?  Because if we love our neighbor there cannot be a "them."  And there can be no justification for supporting a government who is feeling a little bit nervous, or political party, or whatever, doesn't matter, to support them by taking action against "them."

The “them” can be old people.  The “them” can be any race that you want, any religion you want.  By definition that is a violation of the commandment of Christ.  We are to go out to all nations and baptize them so that they can "do what I command."

So ultimately the core of martyrdom is being defined by the powers that be, this martyrdom that is created by the secular and the religious order clashing, by being a group that the people in power or are seeking power, wish to define to be as "them."

On a personal level how does that act in our lives of the question, "Do we have it within us to be a martyr?"  Now, I know that you are very pro-life, you do the Rachel's Vineyard, wonderful things.  But to the degree that it is necessary on the issue of abortion, are you willing to be a martyr?  Are you willing to go out and protest in a forum where the powers that be say that you need to be punished?  To create you as a demon?  Are you willing to be a martyr?

And this very concept of "us" versus "them" in our country today, it was in the news yesterday and probably this morning, I didn't see it, is that is the fundamental premise behind what they call Black Lives Matter.  Because that is a resistance to the concept that, especially young black men, are "them."  Because the minute they are "them," people in their minds can justify something bad happening to them.

And when it is done in the context of religion they become martyrs.  So the question that we have both on an individual basis, are you willing to be a martyr, to save the life of an unborn child?  You are going to die to save the life of that child.

The other things that we have to keep in mind is are we allowing, in the way that we live our lives, people to be discriminated against contrary to the commandment of the Church so the situation exists, wherever, that the powers that be, to enhance their own power, can say, "You're one of "them," and to enhance their power saying, "She's one of them, hit her, kill her.  Do whatever it is.”?

So the question is, both "Are we able to be a martyr to stand up for the teachings of Christ?" And to die as St. Agatha did and as St. Paul Miki and his companions did.  And the second thing is that through our lives, are we enabling the secular power to create people who are "them" and "us" and treat "them" differently?

February 6, 2019 2