Last summer I went back to Red Bank, NJ to visit family and friends. One of my best friends in life and I were heading for a favorite restaurant for lunch and we parked in the church parking lot right next to the railroad station where the restaurant was. As we got out of the car we saw a crowd of Latino men standing on the sidewalk. They hoped that we had come by to hire one or two of them for at least a few hours of hourly pay.
Imagine what it would be like to wait and hope that someone would hire you so you could get just a few dollars to buy food for your family. Such a man is a slave who longs for the shade, a hireling who waits for his wages. Imagine what drudgery it would be to be able bodied, willing to work, but unable to find anyone to hire you – even for minimum wage.
Imagine the troubled nights that are allotted to such dads who cannot find decent work to provide for their families.
Well, that was last summer. Who would have thought back then that such fears could overtake more and more dads and moms as jobs are being threatened and lost?
So, isn’t it timely that we have today’s Scripture reading from Job, Is not man's life on earth a drudgery? I am filled with restlessness until the dawn. My days … come to an end without hope. . . I shall not see happiness again.
O blessed be the name of the Lord for so many of us still having jobs. May we never become insensitive to the plight of those who have lost their income, or lost their home, or lost their security. This is the time, I think, when we can help someone or some family in dire straights; and I’d like to make a recommendation on how to do it.
Give to those in need in a way that they don’t know that it is you doing the giving. Don’t let your left hand know what your right hand is doing. Put cash in a blank envelope and put it in their mailbox when no one is home. Find some way to give so the recipient will have no way of thinking they have to pay you back.
If we now know good fortune, then we do very well to help in every way we can those who find life to be a drudgery. And we do especially well to do this in a way that expects no thanks, and no repayment. This is what is called alms; and almsgiving cancels a multitude of sins. It frees us to realize that all that we have been given is given as a cause for stewardship, not as an enrichment of self.
But now a word to those whose life is indeed a drudgery. Learn from the Gospel:
Day after day people came in droves to seek out Jesus the healer. Multitudes sought him out. The impossible was expected of Him. Where did he get the energy? Where did He get the ability to give and give and give? How could these miracles keep happening?
Rising very early before dawn, [Jesus] left and went off to a deserted place, where he prayed.
On our own we can do nothing. When we give the Lord time and attention, then I can do all things in Him who strengthens me.
Times of drudgery, times of trial, times of fear, times of stress are times to learn how to pray. Pray the rosary. Read the Gospels. Pray the Psalms. Come on Thursdays and spend time before the Blessed Sacrament in Exposition. Oh that there were such a desire for this kind of prayer that we would have to keep the church open all night long 7 days a week. Talk to the Lord and learn how to listen to Him. Yearn for Him. Desire Him. Beg Him for help. Get to know Him. Learn how to be patient and wait upon Him. Trust Him.
He the Lord is our savior, not our checking accounts. He the Lord is our Redeemer, not our savings accounts. And remember: He heals the brokenhearted.
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