The Forgotten Reading (original) (raw)

Ok. I did manage to complete the Lenten Readings, and I hope you all had a wonderful Easter.

At our service today, we had the Priest who usually like to give sermons that explain the readings for that day; in this case, the focal point was on the story of Thomas. I myself think Thomas gets a bad rap for refusing to believe Christ had risen until he saw him with his own eyes. I can imagine that in the week after the Crucifixion and Resurrection that there was a lot of confusion among the followers of Christ.

But the priest managed to ignore the first reading, which tells of the communal, even socialist way that the community of Christ lived:

The community of believers was of one heart and mind, and no one claimed that any of his possessions was his own, but they had everything in common. . . There was no needy person among them, for those who owned property or houses would sell them, bring the proceeds of the sale, and put them at the feet of the apostles, and they were distributed to each according to need.

There are several other passages like this, that speak of the spartan lifestyle of the Apostles and Disciples. Also the numerous times that Christ condemns the wealthy and powerful, and urges Christians to help the poor and powerless.

Somewhere along the way, perhaps as the Church grew in power and prestige, words like the ones above had to be modified, or the passages ignored.

There have also though been folks who have tried to carry this idea a bit. The Catholic Workers come to mind, whom I hope to get in touch with to see about volunteering with. I realized that a theme to the readings for this Lenten season was "service", and I think I heard a call to serve those that Christ served. So if the person whom I remember from the Catholic Worker House answers his phone with, "How may I serve"? I can answer, "That's what I wish to ask you"!