Who Gets Blessed?

Who Gets Blessed?

The Sermon on the Mount

Matthew 5:1 One day as he saw the crowds gathering, Jesus went up on the mountainside and sat down. His disciples gathered around him, 2 and he began to teach them.

crowds

“Much of history has been recorded from the side of the winners, except for the unique revelation of the Bible, which is an alternative history from the bottom: from the side of the enslaved, the dominated, the oppressed, and the poor, culminating in the scapegoat figure of Jesus himself.”

–Fr. Richard Rohr

–Fr. Richard Rohr

“We see in the Gospels that it’s those on the bottom who tend to follow Jesus: the lame, the poor, the blind, the prostitutes, the drunkards, the tax collectors, the sinners, the outsiders, and the foreigners. It is demonstrably those on the inside and the top who crucify him: elders, chief priests, teachers of the Law, scribes, and Roman occupiers.”

“For the first 300 years after Jesus’ death, Christians were the oppressed minority; we were rebels hiding in catacombs. But by the year 400, Christians had changed places. We moved from the catacombs to the basilicas. That is when we started reading the Bible not as subversive literature but as establishment literature.”

–Fr. Richard Rohr

“Once we were in a position of power and privilege, we couldn’t read or understand many Scriptures (for example, the Sermon on the Mount) because we had to maintain our empire, and in this direction the Scriptures give us little support or consolation.”

–Fr. Richard Rohr

“But when Scripture is read through the eyes of vulnerability—what we call the “preferential option for the poor” or the bias from the bottom—it will always be liberating and transformative. Scripture will not be used to oppress or impress. The question is no longer ‘How can I maintain the status quo?’ (which just happens to benefit me), but ‘How can we all grow and change together?’ Now we have no top to protect, and the so-called ‘bottom’ becomes the place of education, real change, and transformation.”

–Fr. Richard Rohr

“The bottom, or what Jesus calls ‘the poor in Spirit’ (Matthew 5:3) in his opening address, is where we have no privilege to prove or protect but much to seek and become. Dorothy Day said, ‘The only way to live in any true security is to live so close to the bottom that when you fall you do not have far to drop, you do not have much to lose.’ From that place, we can be used as instruments of transformation and liberation for the rest of the world.”

–Fr. Richard Rohr

blessedspiritually favored by God

The Poor and Those Who Mourn

Matthew 5:3 “God blesses those who are poor and realize their need for him, for the Kingdom of Heaven is theirs.

4 God blesses those who mourn, for they will be comforted.

The Humble and Those Who Hunger for Justice

5 God blesses those who are humble, for they will inherit the whole earth.

6 God blesses those who hunger and thirst for justice, for they will be satisfied.

The Merciful and the Pure of Heart

7 God blesses those who are merciful, for they will be shown mercy.

8 God blesses those whose hearts are pure, for they will see God.

Those Who Are Stigmatized and Persecuted.

11 “God blesses you when people mock you and persecute you and lie about you and say all sorts of evil things against you because you are my followers. 12 Be happy about it! Be very glad! For a great reward awaits you in heaven. And remember, the ancient prophets were persecuted in the same way.”

When you’re at the end of your rope

When you’ve lost what’s most dear to you

When you’re content with just who you are

When you’ve worked up an insatiable appetite for God

When you care more for others than yourself

God will bless you

When you get your mind and heart put rightWhen you can show people how to

cooperate instead of compete and fightWhen your commitment to God and God’s

purposes provokes persecutionWhen you’ve worked up a good

appetite for GodWhen people put you down or kick you out

or speak lies about you to discredit God

God will bless you

why does God bless these?

R s

empty

“He loved Him now in a different way from before. Everything that had taken place until now had been necessary to bring him to this love.”

Shusaku Endo, Silence, 1966