Sixth Sunday of Ordinary Time

Sixth Sunday of Ordinary Time - Year C

This Sunday we hear the alternate version of the Beatitudes from Luke’s Gospel. In Matthew’s account the meek, the just, and the merciful are blessed; a term that links these dispositions to the covenant of the Old Testament, where each of the commandments is couched as a blessing, in that God has given us a detailed guide of how to remain in a right relationship with God.

Luke on the other hand speaks first about the poor, the hungry and those that weep, and calls them happy.

Happy? In their suffering? How?

And what about the rich that Jesus condemns? Given the popular wisdom that if you have food in a fridge, a roof over your head and a place to sleep that you are wealthier than three-quarters of the world’s population, and given that on a global scale, poverty and wealth are primarily accidents of birth, what on earth is going on here? Are we saying that one in four of God's people are destined for suffering in eternal life? And that the rest should be pleased that they are suffering now because there are better things to come in heaven?

A literalist reading of the bible would suggest that this is exactly what it means, but maybe, as these two seemingly divergent stories are about the same Jesus, we should look at them as a whole.

In Luke's account Jesus clearly expresses what has become known in Liberation Theology as a preferential option for the poor - recognising and (crucially) giving priority to alleviating the suffering of those that are… well… suffering.

Luke draws attention to the inequality and oppression in Jesus' time and challenges us to do the same. Matthew's account then tells us what we can do about it

to be meek and not assume that we are more fortunate because we deserve it in a way that others don't
to be merciful, bringing relief to those in need, and then
to work for justice to end the inequality that condemns people to a life of poverty in the first place.

By addressing Himself to the suffering poor, Jesus tells us clearly that God is near to them. If we heed the balance of the beatitudes, then we will be near them too, and find ourselves in a right relationship with one another, and consequently in a right relationship with God. A happy, blessed relationship.

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