A bright light in a dark world

Today is a day of celebration here at Iowa State. Yesterday’s victory over Iowa was awesome, incredible. As someone who sat through the Jim Criner and Jim Waldon eras of football coaching, a time when you were ashamed to admit that you were a Cyclone fan, it is incredible to see the University of Iowa bring a number four rated team into our Jack Trice stadium and get trounced. It’s a good day to celebrate.

Yet, our celebration is mingled with a couple of other realities this weekend. The first is that today is September 11, 2005, exactly four years after one of the most tragic events in American History. We remember that four years ago, people came to this country and killed thousands of working Americans. Up until a couple of weeks ago, I would have said that this was THE worst tragedy in contemporary American history, yet in looking at all the pictures coming out of New Orleans and the other gulf areas, it’s easy to see that this is another tragedy just as bad if not worse than 9/11. And, this time, we can’t retaliate against enemies. We can’t bring the fight to anyone.

I was pondering these two realities as I reflected on this passage of scripture and I realized something that I hadn’t seen before. If you have ever studied our gospel, you probably know that this is a parallel parable. In other words, two similar events take place with a different outcome. The tragic thing that I think has happened is that we’ve neglected the “surprise” that Jesus listeners would have had. So, let’s set it up and see if I can explain the surprise. There’s a servant who, roughly, owes his master the equivalent to the national debt of the United States. Now, there is no way that he could repay the debt so he says, “Be patient with me, and I will pay you back in full”. The master is so moved with compassion that he, not only, doesn’t throw him, his wife, children, and possessions in jail but, instead, forgives the debt.

The servant leaves and encounters a fellow servant who is in debt to him about a hundred days wages. When this other servant uses the same words that he just used, “Be patient with me, and I will pay you back in full”, there is not pity in the forgiven servant’s voice. He throws his fellow servant in jail and, by all appearances, the money suddenly shows up. The surprising thing, then, is what happens next. When the servant is called in front of the master, the prudent thing the master would have done would have been to demand the hundred days wages for himself. I mean, wouldn’t that make sense? By throwing the servant who is incredibly deep in debt in jail, the master wouldn’t have been able to be repaid at all. It’s better that the servant work and slowly repay the debt over time by, for example, collecting on the debts that others had to him.

The problem and the surprise is that the master didn’t expect, no, didn’t want the servant to repay the loan. He had completely forgiven it and expected this servant to have a sense of gratitude for that forgiveness. That’s the appropriate way to behave when we are treated kindly. We should want behave just as kindly to those around us.

The problem is that it’s so easy to forget the tremendous kindness that God has been to us. There is so much darkness and despair in our world that we can follow our culture’s attitude of tit-for-tat. Our culture tells us that we should be nice to people who are nice to us. We should give forgiveness to those who forgive us. We should give to those who give us something. This is the attitude of many politicians and advertisers, you pat my back and I’ll pat yours.

As Christians, we are called to a more hopeful life than this. God loves us and so we must love others, especially those who don’t love us back. God has forgiven us so we must forgive those who harm us. God has given his life to us to us and so we must give back it back. We must be a beacon of hope in what is oftentimes a dark world.

One institution within our church that is just such a beacon is Catholic Charities. If you don’t know anything about catholic charities, they are an organization of people that are, oftentimes, the first people on the ground after tragedies happen with supplies for those effected and a willingness to be the presence of Christ to people who are in awful circumstances. Last year, the archdiocese of Dubuque gave over a half million dollars to victims of the tsunami. In the entryway of church, you can find an envelope labeled “special collection”. You can also put money in the second collection that will take place at the end of mass and make out a check to Catholic Charities with the word “hurricane” in the memo. In this simple action, we show the hope that sees through tragedy to the ultimate victory over tragedy, Jesus Christ.