Blessed is the Kingdom

Seeking The Kingdom In All Things

We’re All In This Together

Today Barack Obama became the 44th president of the United States. In his inaugural speech he called all Americans to greater responsibility and sacrifice as we meet our current challenges. Today I couldn’t help but recall earlier times in our history when similar challenges were met by a small group of Christians who formed a group called the Catholic Worker. They made it their firm purpose to support the human dignity of all by boldly living out their Christian faith. Dorothy Day is usually the person most associated with the movement, but today it seems more appropriate to take to heart these words of her friend, Peter Maurin in one of his Easy Essays.

Personal Sacrifice

To be our brother’s keeper
is what God wants us to do.
To feed the hungry
at a personal sacrifice
is what God wants us to do.
To clothe the naked
at a personal sacrifice
is what God wants us to do.
To shelter the homeless
at a personal sacrifice
is what God wants us to do.
To instruct the ignorant
at a personal sacrifice
is what God wants us to do.
To serve man for God’s sake
is what God wants us to do.

(woodcut by Fritz Eichenberg)

Related Posts:

Tags: , , , ,


This entry was posted by on Tuesday, January 20th, 2009 at 1:27 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

About The Author

Fr. Christian is the pastor of St. Thomas the Apostle Church in Lenoir City, TN.

Comments

  • Che

    :)

    Also, love the song!

  • B. Hold

    Great post. I came across somebody’s Facebook status earlier and it said, “Is there anything more contradictory than a religious liberal president?”

    I’m baffled as to how people can’t understand the Christ-like concern for the poor and underprivileged of the world. Just because someone doesn’t believe the government has a chance of stopping abortion, doesn’t mean they’re any less loving of the Creator of life.

  • Fr. Christian Mathis

    I should have known that you would like this post chenoa!

    B. Hold,

    My own hope is that good people will stand up against our new president concerning the unborn, but I am happy for the many good things I know he will try to accomplish. But more important to me is what we will do to change the country.

  • Fr. Christian Mathis

    I am hopeful….but agree with your statement that he is most certainly not the messiah. What gives me pause is that many seemed to treat Bush the same way and can’t see the similarities of the current “collective-think” as you call it.

  • David

    Hey, I recognize that woodcut! How many years now?

    I’ve never been more afraid. It’s not so much the man, but the collective-think that sees him as saviour and all us doubters as irrational. I hope I’m wrong.

    We’ve discussed this before, but essentialy I brook government only as far as it guarantees my grace and freewill.

«     »