September 2, 2025
Paulist Fr. Rich Andre preached this homily on the 22nd Sunday in Ordinary Time (Year C) on August 31, 2025 at Old St. Mary’s Catholic Church in Chicago, IL. The homily is based on the day’s readings: Sirach 3:17-29; Psalm 68; Hebrews 12:18-19, 22-24a; and Luke 14:1, 7-14.
This summer and fall, we’re working our way through the Gospel of Luke. Luke is the gospel of the Holy Spirit, the gospel of women, and the gospel of prayer. But in today’s passage, we’ll see two other themes come to the fore, presented by Luke as things that we absolutely must do to be Jesus’ disciples.
First, Luke is the gospel of the poor. Jesus warns us to avoid the dangers of wealth, prestige, and pride. But second, Luke could also be called “the gospel of food.” One out of every five sentences in Luke is about Jesus eating a meal. The table fellowship of Jesus represents many things, but two in particular: the future banquet in heaven, and our present fellowship here at the altar.
When we put these themes together, it’s abundantly clear: Luke is the gospel of social justice. Everyone has a place at the table of the Lord. All are welcome! We must have the humility to accept all people as fellow disciples.
At the table of the Lord, we are all God’s children, in need of God’s love and mercy. Let’s celebrate that!
Back in 2011, United Church of Christ minister Lillian Daniel wrote an article entitled “Spiritual But Not Religious? Please Stop Boring Me.” She pointed out that “spiritual but not religious” people are not the only ones who can commune with God by enjoying sunsets on the beach. People who go to church also find God in nature, but they are also enriched — and challenged — to see God in other people through shared experiences and conflicts. As Daniel writes: “There is nothing challenging about having deep thoughts all by oneself.”
This can get dicey in practice, when we try to share deep thoughts in a community setting. When is it appropriate for a minister to address issues of government policy? When is it not? The Church is clear that ministers cannot endorse political candidates or political parties. However, God is present in people through our shared experiences and conflicts, so sometimes it is appropriate for ministers to address issues of policy. My experience is that if I address a policy that people agree with, they will say it’s appropriate for me to do so. If they don’t agree with the policy, they will accuse me of being inappropriately political in church. It’s a fine line to walk in this highly polarized age!
[Pause.] This Labor Day weekend is the 39th anniversary of one of the great pastoral letters issued by the United States’ Catholic bishops, called Economic Justice For All. The letter does not propose specific economic theories, but it issues a clarion call that Christian disciples must (quote) “avoid a tragic separation between faith and everyday life.” The bishops’ document is nearly 40 years old, but in our current moment, it still packs a punch. When it feels as if corporations have accumulated a frightening amount of power over our lives, and when it feels that technology is evolving at a speed faster than ethics can keep up, the bishops’ wisdom is helpful. In this moment, Millennials and Gen-Zers rightly feel that the odds are stacked against them in reaching financial solvency. They blame it on the Baby Boomers who continue to pull the strings of power and the Gen-Xers like me who didn’t do enough to challenge the system, since we Xers could get by.
Economic Justice For All lays out six core principles. I’ll read each of them to you, two times each:
- Every economic decision and institution must be judged in light of whether it protects or undermines the dignity of the human person.
- Human dignity can be realized and protected only in community.
- All people have a right to participate in the economic life of society.
- All members of society have a special obligation to the poor and vulnerable.
- Human rights are the minimum conditions for life in community.
- Society as a whole, acting through public and private institutions, has the moral responsibility to enhance human dignity and protect human rights.
Lillian Daniel, the minister who wrote the challenging piece about people who considered themselves spiritual but not religious, also co-wrote one of my favorite books about ministry, called This Odd and Wondrous Calling. In one chapter, she tells about working in a university town which offered a nine million dollar tax abatement to entice a four-star hotel chain to renovate an old hotel. Shortly after the hotel received the abatement, the management announced that it would not honor the old contracts with the local hotel staff, even though they had originally promised to do so.
The workers were desperate. They appealed to a coalition of ministers in the city. It was an odd group – including a Pentecostal minister in a lime-green suit, a Jamaican Catholic layman, and Lillian Daniel, sporting her most formal clerical collar. The university and the chamber of commerce threw their support behind the hotel’s plans to renege on their promise, by holding fancy cocktail hours and banquets at the renovated facility, even as the workers reported how terribly they were being treated. The clergy coalition spoke on behalf of the workers and met with the hotel executives – despite protests from some of their own parishioners. When the hotel executives refused to budge, the ministers gave 30 days’ notice that they would organize a boycott of the hotel. One day before the boycott was to take effect, the hotel chain caved, promising to honor the old contracts.
Daniel ends her story by contrasting two meals held at the hotel. The first was a banquet by that university and the chamber of commerce held during the hotel’s attempt to bust the union. The second was a reception after the hotel announced that it would honor the old union contract. Even though executives from the university, the hotel, and the city attended both, the atmosphere at the second meal felt very different, because the workers, clergy, and church people were also in attendance. She writes, “This looked less like a corporate banquet than a heavenly one, in which rich and poor would eat together.”
I think there’s a temptation to focus on only a few elements of today’s gospel passage. This isn’t just about prudently picking the right seat at a dinner party so we don’t look bad. And it’s not about treating everyone nicely so that things go well for us when we get to heaven. We’re supposed to treat our brothers and sisters with dignity because, as the bishops point out, we have a moral responsibility to them in this life, not just to ourselves to get into the next life! Even if we can’t figure out a reasonable way to invite our economically and physically disadvantaged neighbors into our homes, there’s one banquet where we can welcome everyone each week: the Eucharist. Hopefully, in the breaking of the bread, the Holy Spirit will give us the humility to see Christ in one another.