Can the Church Be Poor? 教會能夠貧窮嗎?

Fifteenth Ordinary Sunday, Year B
Theme: Can the Church Be Poor? 教會能夠貧窮嗎?

The gospel reading today reminds us of the importance of interpreting the scriptures in context. It is always unfruitful to argue on the messages conveyed in a piece of short prooftext. For example, the passage today reads, "He summoned the Twelve and began to send them out two by two and gave them authority over unclean spirits" (Mark 6:7). The passage follows Jesus' being rejected in Nazareth. Then Jesus turned His attention to other towns which were waiting to be redeemed. So, He sent the Apostles as forerunners to prepare the ground for evangelization. At the end of the story, Mark wrote, "So they went off to preach repentance. They drove out many demons, and they anointed with oil many who were sick and cured them" (6:12-13). Why did the Twelve do more things than instructed, viz. to preach repentance and to anoint the sick? A few verses before, Jesus gave them authority over unclean spirits. Had Jesus given them the authority to preach? What about anointing the sick? In short, had the Twelve abused the authority delegated them? This question is meaningful because when we look at the history of the Church, we see a lot of scandals and abuses by the clergy. They had done things which they were not supposed to do. Could we hold the Twelve accountable because they started doing things they were not instructed to do?

We don't need to be creative in order to answer the accusation. It is because at the beginning of His public ministry, Jesus proclaimed, "This is the time of fulfillment. The kingdom of God is at hand. Repent, and believe in the gospel" (1:15). Since the Master had already started the proclamation of repentance, His Apostles should be doing similar if not the same things. Furthermore, the Lord had performed a lot of healing miracles. His Apostles should be doing the same as well. But a more conspicuous point was the use of anointment for healing. Unlike the Lord who is able to perform healing miracles without any tools, the Apostles healed in a sacramental manner with the outward sign of anointment. With the considerations above, we cannot jump to the conclusion that the Twelve had abused the authority Jesus gave them.

In fact, the Church exists in history. She grows and develops in time. Therefore, she has to adapt her words and deeds to speak to peoples of different generations. For example, we would find Jesus' teaching on wives divorcing husbands impossible in a purely Jewish context, "And if she divorces her husband and marries another she commits adultery" (12:12). Jesus was supposed to be answering challenges from the Pharisees. How would it be possible for a Jewish woman to divorce her husband? Since Mark wrote for Christians in Rome, here is an adaption to the Roman context which Jesus would not disagree.

No matter how much the world has changed throughout the generations, there must be something unique and defining in God's modus operandi as well as the Church's. For example, God loves to do spectacular things with a small number of underdogs, like the story of Rahab, who helped bringing down Jericho in the book of Joshua; Gideon's 300 men defeating 135,000 Midian army in the book of Judges and the well-known mortal combat between David and Goliath in the book of 1 Samuel. But nowadays, the Church is no longer an underdog and she is big. Why is she different?

Well, she is the embodiment of the Kingdom of Heaven. It is true that she started small but in the end, she will be big because she will be one, holy, catholic and apostolic. She will include all peoples, tongues and nations etc. Jesus mentions this in the parable of the Mustard Seed. What about Jesus' instructions today? It seems that poverty should be one of the characteristics of the Apostolic Church because Jesus says, "He instructed them to take nothing for the journey but a walking stick—no food, no sack, no money in their belts" (6:8). This instruction is consistent with the well-known MO of God because He wants His agents to understand that their works are the works of God. Their successes and failures do not depend on the merits and virtues of the agents but the mercy of God. Therefore, investing more manpower, money, technology and time may not result in more conversions. On the contrary, the agents should be grateful to be called into action to extend the Kingdom of Heaven on earth.

The Church is not God. She is visible and earthly, thus has to obey physical laws. In order to remain big, she has to be rich. There is an overhead to maintain a huge organization on earth! Look at the Catholic Church today. She is big with a membership of roughly 1.4 billion. By any standard, she is also very rich. Is she adapting herself to the modern world by becoming rich? Indeed, the overhead of maintaining the hierarchy and various levels of curia is huge. In order to get so many people connected, the Church needs to consume a lot of resources. Just imagine what it takes for a pope to announce 2025 to be a Jubilee Year, say granting plenary indulgence to whoever recites ten Hail Mary's, using the traditional way of sending out heralds to different parts of the globe! We rely on the mass media to pass the message around. In fact, the Church is lagging behind in deploying Information Technology to process and transmit her social teachings and biblical messages to reach God's People through different social media platforms. Instead she has been busy defending her social and moral doctrines against challenges posed by those modern technologies. From this point of view, it seems that the Church can only be inevitably rich in order to proclaim the good news of reconciliation.

How did the Church become rich in the first place? It came from the trust of the believers. Many parishioners were either busy or rich but lazy. They trusted the clergy and the religious to do charitable works for them. As a logistic centre, the Church is doing a beneficent service to the society by channelling necessities to where they are needed most. Traditionally, the Church has been doing a lot of alms-giving and social works before governments set up their social services departments. Just as Jesus has commented, "You always have the poor with you, but you do not always have me" (John 12:8). The Church continues her charity works and education works even after the states have started running theirs. She does not detach from her past achievements.

Being big necessarily makes the Church rich and she has become legal targets of compensation. In the last few decades, people uncovered more and more Church scandals, including sexual, financial and aboriginal ones etc. Many dioceses are bankrupted. This is just one among many troubles which richness brings to the People of God! From the gospel text today, we know that the Lord wants the Apostles, thus the Church they build to be poor. Two thousand years ago, the Church could afford to be poor because Christians were a minority. It is no longer true today. The question becomes whether the Church could remain big and poor at the same time?

Perhaps we should learn from the poor among us. Not to mention other forms of poverty, the homeless alone are everywhere, not just in underdeveloped regions. They are many because the development of modern societies is driving more and more people into poverty. But how do they manage to survive? They have no plan for tomorrow and live faithfully to the teaching of the Lord's Prayer. They pray to the Father for their daily bread. What about us? Therefore, true to her social teachings and the spirit of the gospel, the Church can sell all she has and give the proceeds to the poor. After all, the Church should not be the owner of her buildings and treasures in the first place. She is only a steward or trustee of all the generous donors!

Where should she start? Where can she find buyers? I think the Vatican should be the last because it is the centre of communion. We may start with the richer churches in the developed countries. I'm sure many Protestant churches are happy and capable to buy out the buildings and treasures of the Catholic Church. Meanwhile, Vatican will start downsizing when local churches start selling out. Catholic organizations NOT under the direct jurisdiction of Vatican, such as Catholic universities and Caritas etc. may continue their operations. After settling all the legal technicalities, each local church joins the poor of their country. Live among them and serve them. Make them the People of God! Do not worry about tomorrow. God will provide!

Beloved brethren! If you deem this proposal too wild, be prepared for more surprises from God. Amen.
God bless!

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