Soul Food
He Calls Us Friends!
Gospel Reading - Matthew 20:1-16
Jesus told his disciples this parable: "The Kingdom of heaven is like a landowner who went out at dawn to hire laborers for his vineyard. After agreeing with them for the usual daily wage, he sent them into his vineyard. Going out about nine o'clock, he saw others standing idle in the marketplace, and he said to them, 'You too go into my vineyard, and I will give you what is just.' So they went off. And he went out again around noon, and around three o'clock, and did likewise. Going out about five o'clock, he found others standing around, and said to them, 'Why do you stand here idle all day?' They answered, 'Because no one has hired us.' He said to them, 'You too go into my vineyard.' When it was evening the owner of the vineyard said to his foreman, 'Summon the laborers and give them their pay, beginning with the last and ending with the first.' When those who had started about five o'clock came, each received the usual daily wage. So when the first came, they thought that they would receive more, but each of them also got the usual wage. And on receiving it they grumbled against the landowner, saying, 'These last ones worked only one hour, and you have made them equal to us, who bore the day's burden and the heat.' He said to one of them in reply, 'My friend, I am not cheating you. Did you not agree with me for the usual daily wage? Take what is yours and go. What if I wish to give this last one the same as you? Or am I not free to do as I wish with my own money? Are you envious because I am generous?' Thus, the last will be first, and the first will be last."
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As a young boy until Junior High I remember my two Black nannies, Lucy and Jan, their kindness, caring, and most of all their cooking, of what we now call "soul food"! Food like red beans and rice, collard greens, and corn bread.
This cooking was born from the first years of their brothers and sisters being brought as slaves in to America. The first years of the white man's hierarchical development as "people of color", (Indians and Hispanics) a part of a hierarchy with the "White man" as the top of that hierarchy.
People of color were considered "less" than their white counterparts, and still continue to do so. For example why is there less than 7% of the Blacks living in San Francisco? Why is Marin so segregated? And this runs the same through out the United States. In industry, especially the food industry, people of color get lower wages, and the manual jobs.
And I would add LGBTQ as another group that is being discriminated against today. Being LGBTQ is not a choice, and I can attest too. And LGBTQ people are being persecuted, and discriminated against every where.
The Bible has been wrongly interpreted to justify "white and straight men's" rights. White and Straight men are superior, born that way, and Jesus says so.
"Soul Food" while once thought as "food for the lower class blacks) is now expensive food for us "higher class white brothers and sisters" and it is one means that Black people can reclaim their right of equality.?
Through eating the soul food they can retell their stories of ancient times, and live into the present age of seeking true equality.
Through eating vegan soul food they can be a shining example of reclaiming ecology for all. For food justice means to bring workers up equally, and to preserve the the environment. All of us animal and non-animal are equal and have the same right to life and health.
All of us are guilty, we (especially us white folk) need to look inwardly within ourselves every day, and see our own racism, and fight like hell to remove it from ourselves by treating everyone equally.
For this racism permeates our very beings, leading to homophobia, transphobia, and all sorts of phobias. We destroy others and ourselves. This same racism leads us to use our sacred Scriptures against? others.
Jesus is not hierarchical, he preached the "Kingdom of God" now, a Kingdom of equality, of love for all, of caring for all, and he died for his preaching, and we believe he rose again calling us to work for the same Kingdom, now, not in some heavenly by and by.
In His teachings, as in our parable above he stressed we are all brothers and sisters, and due the same wage. Look at our streets, look at climate change, if we had the same wage, with the same respect for each other and the environment we would not be where we are now. Deo Gratias! Thanks be to God"!
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Fr. River Damien Sims, sfw, D.Min., D.S.T
P.O. Box 642656
San Francisco, CA 94164
领英推荐
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Let Love Ache
Father, give me the courage to keep on loving.
when others keep on hurting.
help me to live an achy love, a gritty,
persistent and emptying love;
a love that’s not afraid to flow toward the other
who has little left to offer in return.
And may I tread faithfully with heaven
through the unfinished work that surrounds me.
Commoners_Communion
Strahan Coleman
Today we begin our nine day season of prayer until the Feast of St. Michael on September 29.
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