2nd Thursday of Lent - Rich Man & Lazarus

 

Whenever today’s Gospel is proclaimed at Mass it reminds me when I was in seminary during a homiletic class, the teacher surprised our class and told us to give a homily a spontaneous homily without any preparation during class. After this Gospel was read, when it was my turn to give the homily, I said, “Jesus sets before us a poor man who longed to eat food, while the rich man sumptuously eats his meal who ignored the poor man’s need and a dog licks his sores. The poor man dies and goes to heaven and the rich man dies and goes to hell. So the moral of the parable is, if you don’t help the poor, you will go to hell!” The seminary professor obviously didn’t like what I said. It taught me to be more pastoral when speaking.

In today’s parable Jesus depicts a poor man who is kind, gentle, peace with himself and peace with his suffering and lived in harmony even with a wild guard dog.

Our Lord also depicts a rich man who is selfish, lacks compassion for his fellow man, enjoys displaying his wealth and has no peace with himself.

Did the poor man sense that the dogs, like himself, were unjustly despised and ill-treated? The reader is not told. In the 11^th century a monk who was a biblical scholar said, “I understand the licking of Lazarus’ sores gave him relief and eased his pain. This reminds us that the silent, unspeaking animals felt compassion for him and they helped him and cared for him more than humans…”

While what the monk says is true that it seems as though the dog shows more concern than the rich man, I think it is understood animals really don’t have emotions, but they do instinctively sense the emotions of people and respond in a way, they think would be helpful.

I can remember when I was a kid and had sores from abrasions perhaps of falling of my bicycle or scraping my knees doing boys’ things, that our pet dog, would lick my sores of my scabs. Of course, my mother was horrified I let the dog do that, but it actually felt good when the dog did it.

Lazarus was not angry nor wish to retaliate out of vengeance, rather he endured his suffering with resignation. Lazarus is a model of mercy, while the rich man shows no mercy.

While Lazarus was not healed, nor did he end up well fed, he was in anguish primarily because he was ignored by a fellow human being who should have shown compassion. The source of his greatest pain was the hurt he received from the rich man.

After both die, the poor man is now comforted, while the rich man is being tortured for his lack of compassion and selfishness.

Today, let us open our eyes to see the needs of those around us and may we show compassion to those who are longing for it and may the Virgin Mary, our Lady of Consolation, be a consolation to those who feel abandoned by mankind.