Isaiah is a prophet from whom we often hear during Advent. Today Isaiah speaks about a lofty city that is brought down by the Lord, a city that ignores justice and the poor. The city is turned to dust. The dust, in turn, is trampled down by the footsteps of the poor and the oppressed.
Isaiah's message is at the essence of Catholic social teaching. Even so, I believe that we as a nation and we as Christians often struggle with the question: What does it mean to hear the cry of the poor? How does God want us to respond? In my ministry as a lay missionary, I worked full-time at a soup kitchen & food in a large city in Canada where I had a lot of first hand interaction with the homeless, street people, prostitutes, and drug addicts. I left that experience with more questions than answers. Many of us want to help, but we are not sure how. After living in several communities in the Mississippi Delta since I came here as a public high school teacher in the Delta, I often see our social welfare system hurting people and teaching them the wrong values rather than helping them. Even though it’s not easy to struggle with the poor and to accompany them, it is something with are called to do. We don’t have to look overseas or the large urban areas of our country to hear the cry of the poor – it is right here in our own community – that is probably obvious to all of us.
How are we responding to the poor in our midst – how are we creating a just society? Or, are we a lofty city that will be taken down by the Lord?
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