Who Are the Blessed Ones of God?

Who are the blessed ones of God?

Who are the blessed ones of God? Weren’t those who heard Jesus’ first sermon blessed? Perhaps some of them had been with Jesus at his baptism and seen the dove alight on him or heard God’s voice speaking to him. Perhaps they had heard him call Peter, Andrew, James, and John and were now following him themselves. Maybe some of them had witnessed, or even benefited from, the healings that Jesus had done after he had called the fishermen to follow him. Now they watched him go up the mountain, to begin to deliver the first of the five sermons that the Gospel of Matthew has recorded. Up on the mountain, perhaps Jesus reminded some of the disciples of Moses, who had come down from Mount Sinai bearing God’s commands. Would Jesus give these fledgling disciples a new set of commandments? Would he renew or restate God’s covenant with the Jewish people? Those who heard Jesus preach that day were oppressed by the Romans and ignored by their religious leadership. They definitely needed something. Actually, what they heard from Jesus didn’t sound like anything Moses had taught. In his sermon Jesus sounded more like one of the prophets, especially Micah and Isaiah, offering them God’s reassurance. In fact, in what Jesus said some of the disciples even heard echoes of the consolation offered to the returning exiles towards the end of the book of Isaiah.

As he began this first sermon up on the mountain, Jesus drew deeply on Jewish tradition. Perhaps he especially had in mind the blessings mentioned in the book of Deuteronomy or in some of the psalms. He did not give his disciples new commands. Instead he told them that they were God’s people. They were God’s people now, and they would be truly blessed by God when God’s realm was a full reality. They were God’s people because of who they were now. Even though it was not yet fully manifest, because they were following Jesus, a change had already taken place in their lives – the kingdom of heaven had come near to them. Perhaps the way Jesus taught the disciples that day sounded to them just a little like his teachings sound in Clarence Jordan’s Cotton Patch Version:

The spiritually humble are God’s people, for they are citizens of God’s new order.
They who are deeply concerned are God’s people, for they will see their ideas become reality.
They who are gentle are God’s people, for they will be God’s partners across the land.
They who have an unsatisfied appetite for right are God’s people, for they will be given plenty to chew on.
The generous are God’s people, for they will be treated generously.
Those whose motives are pure are God’s people, for they will have spiritual insight.
People of peace and good will are God’s people, for they will be known throughout the land as God’s children.
Those who have endured much for what is right are God’s people; they are citizens of God’s new order.
You are all God’s people when others call you names, and harass you and tell all kinds of false tales on you just because you follow me. Be cheerful and good-humored, because your spiritual advantage is great. For that’s the way they treated those of conscience in the past.

And when Jesus had finished reassuring the disciples that the reign of God belongs to anyone who hears themselves in any of these statements, that as his followers it belongs to them here and now, he gave them a challenge. Could they fully live into God’s blessings in their own lives? Could they form communities of love that were fully blessed by God? Could they help these communities of love endure in a hostile world? They had God’s reassurance: could they join him in fully living into their identity as God’s people?

Who are the blessed ones of God? At first glance it was unlikely that, at her birth in the middle of the fifth century, a baby girl named Brigid would be considered blessed by God. She was the daughter of the slave of a royal official, and she spent her childhood as the servant of the family of a Druid priest. Early in her life she became a Christian, possibly after having heard St. Patrick preach. When she reached her teens, Brigid followed the law and returned to her father, who arranged for her to marry a young bard. Brigid refused. Instead, she went to her bishop and took her first vows as a nun. Other women began to join her. In 468 she founded a convent at Cill Dara, (Kildare), “Church of the Oak,” a place that was sacred to a pagan goddess and that was a source of sacred fire. To make sure that her community could receive the sacraments, Brigid persuaded the anchorite Conlaed to seek ordination and to move his community of monks to Kildare to establish a double monastery for women and men. Brigid and her nuns took equal roles with the men in governing the community, and Brigid herself actively participated in policy making at church conventions. She was also great traveler, and at the invitation of other bishops, she started convents all over Ireland. Brigid’s fame spread rapidly throughout Ireland. As Irish monks wandered throughout the rest of the British Isles and the Continent, others came to know of her.

Brigid was surely blessed by God in her devotion to Our Lord and in the many holy communities that she founded. But Brigid was truly blessed by God in her care and concern for the poor and needy, especially lepers and the victims of violence. She especially could not bear to see anyone hungry or cold. While she lived with her father, she often gave away things that belonged to him. One story relates how she gave a leper a beautiful sword of her father’s. Unaware that this was an act of charity, her father was enraged. What could he do to control this wayward and profligate daughter? Stories also abound of Brigid’s concern for the poor and needy. When a leper woman asked her for milk, she was healed of her illness. Brigid enabled two blind men to receive their sight. She loved birds, and was also said to have tamed a wolf at the request of a local chieftain who had lost his favorite dog. When she died in 525, Brigid was buried beneath the altar of the small cathedral of Kildare. In England today there are at least nineteen churches dedicated to her, including St. Bride’s on Fleet Street in London, home especially to journalists. She is still venerated in Ireland and in many other places. We’ll remember her on Tuesday, February 1st, her feast day, which is itself an ancient sacred day celebrating Imbolg, the Celtic spring festival. Surely Brigid was a blessed one of God.

Who are the blessed ones of God? On this day in 1948 a young Hindu fanatic shot to death Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, called by his admirers Mahatma or “Great Soul.” Gandhi was marching together with Hindus and Muslims in New Delhi. He was vainly attempting to reconcile the two communities following the partition of the Indian subcontinent and the establishment of independent nations in Hindu-majority India and Muslim-majority Pakistan. During his long life – he was born in 1869 – Gandhi did more than perhaps anyone else to advance the cause of nonviolence and to pursue change, even difficult political change, in ways that promoted peace and enhanced human dignity. He was not a Christian – despite the concerted efforts of many of his Christian admirers to convert him. He could not accept what some call the “singularity “of Christ, i.e., the church’s claim that salvation is available only through Christianity. Gandhi was also troubled by the tendency in the India of his time of converts to Christianity to leave behind their own cultures and become westernized. He was also critical of much religious authority, including that of Hindu priests, and he thought that missionaries in India exercised a kind of spiritual imperialism. Nevertheless, Gandhi was deeply influenced by the teachings of Tolstoy and by the Sermon on the Mount – today’s Gospel reading. He especially affirmed Jesus’ redemptive suffering on the Cross. Even though he never became a Christian, his fame spread far beyond India through his devotion to the cause of nonviolence and peace. When he died, a newspaper correspondent observed, "Just an old man in a loincloth in distant India: yet when he died, humanity wept." For many Christians, most especially for Martin Luther King, Jr., himself murdered by a fanatic, Gandhi is proof that even non-Christians can function for Christians as saints, as those who show forth to us, God’s love at work in the world. Surely Gandhi was a blessed one of God.

Who are the blessed ones of God? Listen, really listen to what Jesus is saying, for ultimately he is speaking directly to us. He offers us hope, and he points in the direction of compassion for all those around us. “You are blessed in this life, “ he reassures us, “whenever you acknowledge your spiritual dependence on God, seek to heal all kinds of brokenness in the world, grieve over the sufferings of others, forgive others, and ardently pursue peace, trusting always that God’s Spirit is leading you.” When we hear, truly hear, Jesus’ words as addressed to us, then we too are united with all the blessed company of his faithful followers.