A Question from the King

ONLINE REFLECTION, ST. PAUL’S, FOLEY

JULY 15, 2020

TEXT:   Matthew 25:31-46

Years ago, I was serving my first cure as a priest on the Mississippi Gulf Coast.  I was also deeply involved in the Diocese of Mississippi’s annual medical mission to the central American country of Honduras.

I had been asked to do a video presentation on the mission for our diocesan convention. So, I found myself interviewing Bishop Leo Frade, who was then the Bishop of Honduras.  I was recording the interview.

When asked about the impact the Mississippi medical mission had on the very rural area of it’s focus (I described as being 35 miles from the nearest light bulb), Bishop Frade went to the passage from today’s lectionary – what is known as the Great Judgement.

You know the story.  It is best known by verse 40: And the king will answer them, “Truly I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these who are members of my family, you did it to me.” 

Years later, I was serving a parish in Starkville, Mississippi.  I was trying to persuade a pediatrician, who was a member of the parish, to go on the mission.  He objected. “David, we’ve got all these poor people here in town and in the Mississippi Delta who need medical care. Why do we need to go to Honduras?”

He had a good point.  We can find our mission to the hungry, the sick, the stranger, the naked, the homeless, those in prison at our own front door.  They are all around us. Our eyes of faith can help us see them.  Our hands of faith can help us serve them.

Jesus did not say that those people needed to be blameless.  They are who they are.  The work of caring for them is our mission.  The questions asked by the King in the Great Judgement are the questions we will ultimately have to answer.