What a Life! for October 10-14, 2007

I recently returned from a vacation in France. I got a chance to visit the northern part of the country – the Normandy coast where the World War II invasions took place, the Abbey of Mont Saint Michel where I attended a beautiful Sunday liturgy with the Monks and nuns, and many other historical and beautiful sites.

I also spent a few days in Paris. The trip was fantastic but it was great to be back home.

In the late evenings before bedtime, the only English speaking television stations were CNN and a sport channel that featured mostly the current soccer and rugby tournaments.

The biggest stories that dominated the CNN news were the demonstrations by the Buddhist monks in Myanmar, formally known as Burma, and the crackdown by the military junta that followed.

Myanmar is literally shut off from the rest of the world. They screen the Internet so no one can send messages to anyone outside the country. Fortunately, many sophisticated people knew how to get around the government filters and posted pictures of what was going on with the military.

Trucks of soldiers entered the main city, Yangon, and took positions at strategic locations. They also employed a jungle fighting force that had taken the lead in a massacre of civilians during the country’s last demonstration in 1988.

The difference this time was in the communication. The world knows what is going on and is protesting the use of force.

The military junta is led by a tough and reserve military man, Senior Gen. Than Shwe, 74. He received some unwanted publicity last year when an extraordinary video of his daughter’s wedding circulated through the country and beyond, and remains available on the file-sharing Web site YouTube.

In the video, the bride, Thandar Shwe, is weighted down with dozens of diamonds the size of pebbles, making her hair sparkle in the reflection of glittering jewelry around her neck. Her wedding gifts were worth many millions of dollars. This is in a country where most of the people live on a dollar a day.

This made me think of Jesus’ story of the rich man and Lazarus.

Lazarus was at the doorstep of the rich man. He failed to respond to Lazarus’ needs. The rich man didn’t kick Lazarus or express any type of violence toward Lazarus. He didn’t even call the police. To the rich man, Lazarus didn’t exist. He was a nonperson.

In the exchange that follows, the rich man wants Lazarus to be his lackey. He asks Abraham to have Lazarus dip his finger in water and put on his tongue because he is suffering from the fires of hell.

The rich man never looks at Lazarus as a person. He is only someone he can use for his own selfishness.

What can we learn from all this? First, Jesus wants us to see people as people with all their wants, needs and aspirations. We should never use other people. Rather, we should be open to see how we can respond to their needs.

Secondly, we are the rich man.

Some may protest and say, “I’m not rich.” This is true if we are comparing ourselves with Bill Gates or another wealthy billionaire. However, as Americans, we possess and use more of the world’s resources than any other country. We have to be willing to share our resources to help those in need.

We also have to be willing to expand our world and be sensitive to the plight of people around the world, like the Buddhist monks and Burmese people who are suffering because they marched for freedom. These are real people at our doorsteps. How do we respond?