Gospel: Lk 10:38-42
Jesus entered a village where a woman whose name was Martha welcomed him. She had a sister named Mary who sat beside the Lord at his feet listening to him speak. Martha, burdened with much serving, came to him and said, “Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me by myself to do the serving? Tell her to help me.” The Lord said to her in reply, “Martha, Martha, you are anxious and worried about many things. There is need of only one thing. Mary has chosen the better part and it will not be taken from her.”
Homily
As a young priest in Paraguay, after my first year in the country I lived in a very poor neighbourhood of the city. It was my habit to tell the parishioners that I would visit them for Sunday lunch and invariably I met a huge meal, prepared with a lot of love for their parish priest. After a while though I became very uncomfortable with the expense that people were putting themselves through for me so I stopped going to visit on Sundays and only went if the family promised not to prepare anything special. I was uncomfortable with the special treatment.
I remembered that situation as I prepared the homily for this weekend because the Gospel passage deals with a similar situation. Jesus is a very important rabbi. He is becoming more and more known and recognized as an important person who has a great love for the downtrodden. In accepting the invitation to the home of Martha and Mary, Jesus was breaking the normal conventions which did not allow a rabbi to accept such invitations from a woman. In a very true way Jesus was treating Martha and Mary as the equal of men.
Martha and Mary must have been overjoyed when Jesus accepted the invitation to their home. Immediately Martha sets about preparing a good meal for Jesus. Martha had slipped back into her role as a woman. Mary on the other hand remains with Jesus in the role which men normally adopted. At such dinners, women cooked and served, men sat together and talked while they awaited the meal. Martha calls Mary back to the role that women are supposed to have, i.e. to be at the service of men, so she tells Jesus; “Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me by myself to do the serving? Tell her to help me.” Jesus refuses to put Mary back into that role. He tells Martha; “Martha, Martha, you are anxious and worried about many things. There is need of only one thing. Mary has chosen the better part and it will not be taken from her.” Having liberated them from a subservient role, Jesus was not about to send Mary back into that role. Mary had chosen the better part and it was not to be taken from her.
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It would be very easy to interpret this incident only from a feminist view point but that would be a grave mistake. I have learnt that the struggle for equality and justice can never be selective. If we are against oppression it must be across the board and so this teaching of Jesus is not simply about the liberation of women, it is about the liberation of all who are denied the equality which we are all meant to enjoy as sons and daughters of the same God.
This intuition of Jesus concerning the radical equality of all people before God has to be understood and lived. It is a truth which has to be taught and modeled. While it is true that we all carry differing potentialities within us we must never forget that we are equal before God and that this equality must always be respected.
This is how the saints all lived. They struggled to ensure that all God’s children were liberated from whatever held them in oppression and denied them their rights as equal to all others before God. The saints did this through the provision of education, catechesis, health care and social services for those whose dignity as sons and daughters of God was denied. Today you and I as disciples of Jesus can do no less.
As we thank God then for those who have made it their life purpose to have the dignity and equality of all recognized and accepted, we pray for ourselves that we too may join in the ongoing struggle to ensure that all enjoy the dignity and equality of the sons and daughters of God.
Prayer
All powerful and ever-loving God, the world in which we live espouses values which do not recognize the radical equality of all the sons and daughters of God. The thirst for power and prestige and please condemns so many of your sons and daughters to lives in which their human dignity and their equality with others are recognized. Help us your disciples to so live that we will in our words and especially our actions proclaim the dignity of every human being and the radical equality of all before You, our God. We ask this through the intercession of Mary, our Mother and your son Jesus. Amen
