25th Sunday

25th Sunday Ordinary
September 19, 2004

"Hear this, you who trample upon the needy and destroy the poor of the land!...Never will I forget what you have done" (Amos 8: 4-7). "And the master commended that dishonest steward for acting prudently." (Luke 16: 1-13)
Amos, the prophet of the poor, warns Israel of the consequences for extracting the most from those least able to afford it. It is hard to avoid the implications of this for our own times. We have not learned much in the 2500 years or so between Amos and now. "Doing well" still often implies getting rich, and getting rich happens far too often at the expense of the poor. (On the other hand Oprah Winfrey apparently just bought brand-new vehicles for everyone in her audience! All is not lost) The prophet promises that the Most High will not soon forget. Justice will ultimately be done, but apparently not right now.
Jesus tells the story of the "unjust servant" who, by being clever and dishonest with his master's wealth, avoids personal disaster and even gets promoted instead of losing his job. This story is complicated because it contains Jesus' actual story followed by explanations of it's meaning. The last familiar line about the impossibility of serving God and money, while no doubt true, does not seem to fit the story as originally told. Jesus' idea seems to be that we need to be as clever and flexible in spiritual matters as the servant was with "worldly" problems. I am reminded of Jacob tricking his father Isaac into giving him the blessing intended for this oldest brother, thus furthering God's plan for his people. Does this mean we should practice deceit to further our spiritual goals? Obviously not. So what are we to learn from the unjust steward?
We have a saying: "Whatever it takes". This could be applied to gaining the kingdom of heaven. Maybe we don't have to be perfect in affairs of the spirit, after all. Perhaps the Most High will take a check written on insufficient funds. The steward secretly wrote off part of what was owed to his master in order to save his own skin and was rewarded for doing so. It was not exactly fair, but it got the job done. In the Lord's prayer, we say "forgive us our sins (often translated as "debts") as we forgive those who sin against us." We all hold on dearly to hurts, slights and offenses which are very difficult to let go. Could we "write off" the apologies we know must come to us before things can be made right?
We tell our kids on a regular basis that "life is not fair", but often have a hard time accepting this ourselves. Adult experience is full of examples of the unjust prospering and the just suffering. The steward was rewarded unfairly, but to his credit he knew how to take care of himself. Perhaps another application of this story includes an implicit rejection of the idea that our notions of justice and fairness always prevail. In the kingdom of God the Master rewards forgiveness even when it is not "fair".
Loris Buccola