Bellarmine Chapel Holy Thursday Reflection

March 20, 2008

By Tony Stieritz

I want to invite you to imagine what would have gone through your mind had you been an apostle there with Jesus that night.  If I were one of those having my feet washed, I think it would have taken me some time before the message began to make itself clear.  And whenever it would, I probably would have been grasping, as I really am today, for some way to respond to Jesus with a real “thank you”.

But before that moment, I would have been at a very different place.  I am sure that I would have reacted a lot like Peter did initially, pulling away and finding Jesus’ actions out of place for someone of his stature.  I have this feeling that if I were hanging around one of the most popular, revolutionary and literally miraculous people of the time, I would have been swept up quite a bit into some version of hero worship.  Like everyone else, I probably would have been ecstatic that God had finally dropped out of the sky to fix this crazy world for us, to save us from all its suffering and turmoil.

In addition, up until that moment, I would have seen myself as one of the insiders.  Having been invited into the inner circle of this great savior, I bet I would have been beaming with self-importance.  Sitting with my other colleagues and Jesus around a private Eucharistic table, physically limited in size and number of seats available, I might have been duped into thinking this way. 

I find it very interesting, though, that in place of the detailed Eucharistic meal of bread and body, wine and blood described in Matthew and Mark’s Gospels, John instead shares this image of Jesus, coming down from the pedestal where “Masters and Lords” are supposed be, and dropping to the ground to wash people’s feet.  In addition, he follows it up by instructing his followers to not hoard this special experience, but to break out of the inner circle and share it with the world, for “there are many rooms” in Jesus’ circle.  So with Peter, I’d now be seeing a different image of what real saviors do.  I need to take that in.

The first time in my life when I think I first had a glimpse of this Christian recognized what Jesus’ effort was about, I was in junior high school, and my mother was dealing with her father, who was slipping into the clutches of Alzheimer’s.  Week after week, I watched my mom drive down to nursing homes and hospitals as she cared for him.  I saw her struggle each weekend, going into each visit wondering if he would recognize her and speak to her about his day, maybe just repeating a few of his thoughts several times over, or if he would turn irrationally violent and demand to be released from the care of the nursing staff.  As things grew worse, his body broke down and his mind left him as a whisper of the man who raised her.  Near the end, she would be there throughout the day just to watch him in bed and rest her hand on his while he slept. 

As a young person, that was one of my first encounters with true human suffering, with how dirty feet in this world can really be.  It was my first witness of true love and compassion from one person to another, of how beautiful it is for someone to selflessly want to wash the dirt away.  I saw that the only thing I knew how to do was to accompany her on those visits to wherever my grandfather laid and to not become too squeamish if she would show tears.  While I was still uncomfortable and bothered by all of this, something in her example told me that it wasn’t right for the washing to stop with her and my grandpa.

But Peter, when he initially refuses Jesus’ service, doesn’t realize that this is the way God breaks through in this world.  He keeps expecting God to keep handing over salvation through Jesus-hero worship.  So Jesus tells him that if he doesn’t take this foot washing gift to heart, he will have NOTHING in common with him.  NOTHING.  Like any one of us would, then, Peter asks Jesus to not only proceed, but to spread some of that divine mojo all over him.

Of course, the moral of the story is that we have to imitate this radical model of selflessness if we want to truly have something in common to talk about with Jesus.  And it goes beyond personal encounters within our immediate family or clan.  Just as the apostles were taught this org anizationally as the first incarnation of the Church, so we as a parish move outward to bring such actions into the world. 

I think this happens through direct service with St. Vincent de Paul when parishioners visit and get to know the poor and lonely in their homes.  Or when our youth build homes in Appalachia .  It happens through advocacy when we write letters with Bread for the World to demand our Congress members to support legislation tackling poverty and hunger.  It happens through community org anizing when we work through the AMOS Project and win local policies that require contracts for low-income and minority workers on public projects.  It happens through solidarity when we support schools in Tanzania and Guatemala and buy Fair Trade crafts and coffee from El Salvador .  We see the work of so many in this parish as teachers, healers, org anizers, parents and youth to serve and empower others.

These activities for the world pay homage to our Gospel tonight.  And they’re not for just the activists in our community to take care of.  For they are sacramental acts.  They are just as sacramental as the Eucharist itself.  Indeed, Pope Benedict himself proclaimed in his first encyclical, titled, God Is Love, that there are three ultimate and inseparable responsibilities of the Church: proclaiming the Word of God, celebrating the sacraments, and exercising the ministry of charity and social justice.  This act of washing each others’ and the world’s feet turns the Last Supper into concrete reality.  It is the way that Christ will keep breaking back into our world, and he wants our help to do it.

Finally, I admittedly struggle sometimes with this kind of interaction with our neighbor without keeping score.  I’m a recently happily married man, and it’s become evident to me that the only way to stay happy is to not keep score.  Believe me, in my worse moments I’ve tried, and I stopped counting when it became apparent that I was not coming out ahead.  Add to that that Jessica is soon to go through childbirth, I know that I may never catch up.  Rather, this action of washing feet must come freely out of our love and concern for the life and well-being of the other.  And we do it over and over again, even for people whom we’ve never met in some other part of the world, not because we seek their gratitude, but because we love life itself.