A sermon from November 26, 2023, the Last Sunday after Pentecost / Christ the King
Thank you for the privilege to be here this morning. It’s a tribute to Rev Anne’s courage to ask me to preach today. Remember, whatever happens up here is not her fault, nor the vestry’s.
I am Kathy Daly, longtime St Clarian. I came from a Roman Catholic background, spent some gentle years as a Quaker, and later found myself at St Clare’s in the mid 1980s.
I am co-chair from churchside of the Back Door Food Pantry, working alongside my friend and Co-Chair from TBE, Ellie Davidson. The pantry is composed of volunteers from St Clare’s, Temple Beth Emeth, the Muslim community, and the community at large, and has a coordinating committee of 11 people. There are many in this congregation who volunteer at the pantry, and we cherish you all.
We are a completely volunteer effort, generously supported by you and TBE members, members of the Muslim community, as well as others who also believe in what we do. Our pantry was founded in 2007 by four St Clarians: Jane Crighton, Margery Luther, Judi Kleinman…… and Susan Jones Draffen (our current Junior Warden.) These women thought the neighborhood needed a food pantry, and so started one, giving those of us who came after, the gift of the best call to mission ever: To provide hunger relief with dignity.
Dignity. This tells us that our patrons, our guests, deserve more than the “noblesse oblige of “here take these scraps, I am sure you can cut out the bad parts…” Nope, doesn’t happen here.
We heard this today in the Gospel: “Truly, I tell you, whatever you did for the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.” Less. Lesser. Least. With “least” being, perhaps confoundingly, the superlative. You can be “less THAN,” or “lesser THAN,” One cannot be any less than least. Least puts you incomparably at the bottom. Jesus was at the Sea of Galilee when he spoke those words, and it was Matthew who, sometime after the year 70CE wrote them down. Hold that thought.
There was a story you might recall about a pastor, supposedly in Australia, who disguised himself as an unhoused man, disheveled, unkempt, who lingered outside the church where he was to begin his role as a new pastor. He was pretty much ignored or worse by the congregants entering the church, and as the service was starting he entered and sat in a front pew…(That’s how we know he was not an Episcopalian) Finally (tah-dah!) he was introduced as the new faith leader, as he removed the beard, and hat and his rumpled coat… Upon investigation, that myth-buster site, snopes.com said…nah, this particular story never happened.
BUT, in fact, there were instances where similar events DID happen. For instance, in 2008, a Rev. Rigby in the United Kingdom did just that. The hat, the beard, disheveled, all of it. He received-can you guess?- a chilly reception from the churchgoers as they entered the church and then —he joined them. Soon he revealed his identity, and then, he told them from the pulpit that they were “a stingy lot.” In 2013 a Mormon Bishop did the same thing in Utah, and in 2018 a megachurch preacher in IL did as well. There are no doubt others. Some of the members of the congregations were ashamed at how that had failed to live up to Jesus’ call. And some were—outraged. “You tricked us!” Was it a stunt or a litmus test? Your assignment for coffee hour: Discuss.
Let’s go back to Matthew’s account. If I were his 10th grade English teacher, I might circle the word “Least” in red and add a question mark. Really, Matthew, is this the word you want to use? Understanding that many scholars think he wrote in Koine Greek, and he would have been reporting from Jesus’ original words in Aramaic about 70 years previous. So word choices and translations are certainly less than absolute. But, still, I quibble. And the focus of my quibble is the word “least.”
At the Back Door Food Pantry, our patrons, well, who are they? They are the food insecure. And we hear their stories: a job lost, an illness with crippling medical bills, illness both physical and mental, a divorce, new to this country and just getting settled. They are those for whom the rug of life has been unceremoniously tugged from under their feet. And the cascading effects of one negative life event to another can cause an exponential tumble.
Are our patrons “the least of us?” Often when a patron arrives for the first time, they are ashamed. Before they need food, they need reassurance as they say “I have never needed a pantry before.” Or, “ What’s wrong with me that I can’t feed my family, even with two jobs?” We remind them that today they need help, and one day they may be in a position to help others. It’s a partnership.
Are they the least of us? Not the words I would use. Some are the bravest of us, navigating seemingly impossible conditions; Perhaps they are the grittiest of us, confronting their need and patching together the means to try to gain life’s equilibrium again. How about calling them “the most human of us.”
I had a friend who worked for Michigan Rehabilitation long ago, who used to say he was “temporarily able-bodied.”
Who are our patrons? They are us. Us, one paycheck away, one medical emergency too many, one divorce, one illness, one natural disaster, or one war. You and I are “temporarily secure.”
Jesus talked about the poor a lot. In the Gospel of Mark, he says, “The poor are always with us.” I would like to think that, had the ancestors of St Clarians been there, someone might have piped up to ask “Why do you think that is?” Or would have said “Let me do some academic research and publish a scroll on the subject.” Or formed a committee, a task force, where refreshments would have been served (perhaps cake?) as they grappled with the challenge of the poor. None of that happened, of course (that we know of) and two thousand years later, the poor are with us still. Take heart! We are not alone in our work. In the darkness of the news of the world, remember, there are people of goodwill everywhere.
Our pantry is a partnership, the Children of Abraham, with our Jewish and Muslim partners.
In the Jewish Talmud, it says “Do not be daunted by the enormity of the world’s grief. Do justly now, love mercy now, walk humbly now. You are not obligated to complete the work. But neither are you free to abandon it.”
Elizabeth Lindsey, our representative from the Muslim community to the Coordinating Committee, told me that this is one of her favorite teachings from the Prophet Mohammed: “None of you shall become a true believer until you want for your brother what you want for yourself. “
Finally, Ram Das, an American spiritual teacher from the 1960’s, said this: We’re all just walking each other home.
So, let’s continue to do it together. Jesus would have wanted it that way.
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Kathy Daly, November 2023