On Holy Thursday 2013, a few days after his election as Pope, Pope Francis surprised the world by choosing to wash the feet of inmates at a juvenile detention facility, rather than to wash the feet of selected attendees at mass within the Vatican. He continued to wash the feet of prisoners and those outside the church on numerous occasions.
Why?
Pope Francis’ repetitive answer is that he wants to lead us toward becoming a church who goes out—who brings Christ to those on the edge—the prisoner, the outcast, the handicapped, the forgotten. He has also spoken of the great value of the humility gained in washing the feet of those who do not necessarily revere us.
On that same first Holy Thursday as pope, Pope Francis said to priests at the Chrism Mass in the Vatican: “We need to ‘go out’ then, in order to experience our own anointing, its power, and its redemptive efficacy: to the ‘outskirts’ where there is suffering, bloodshed, blindness that longs for sight, and prisoners in thrall to many evil masters. It is not in soul-searching or constant introspection that we encounter the Lord….The power of grace comes alive and flourishes to the extent that we, in faith, go out and give ourselves and the Gospel to others, giving what little ointment we have to those who have nothing, nothing at all…..This I ask you: be shepherds with the ‘smell of the sheep,’ make it real, as shepherds among your flock, fishers of men…Dear lay faithful, be close to your priests with affection and with your prayers, that they may always be shepherds according to God’s heart.”
The smell of the sheep. The phrase has caught on. But what does it mean? What does it mean for us lay faithful?
It reminds me of a famous quote by Dorothy Day: “There are two things you should know about the poor: they tend to smell and they are ungrateful.”
Dirty feet tend to smell, too.
Perhaps thoughts of dirty feet and smelly sheep seem counter to this wonderful day and liturgy: Holy Thursday. On Holy Thursday, the night before he died, Jesus washed his disciples’ feet, instituted the Eucharist, and gave a new meaning to the Jewish Passover. He gave the wonderful Farewell Discourse recorded in John which the Church will use for readings through much of the Easter season.
Of all these important events, it is the washing of the feet that the Church gives us as the Gospel today.
“So, during supper,
fully aware that the Father had put everything into his power
and that he had come from God and was returning to God,
he rose from supper and took off his outer garments.
He took a towel and tied it around his waist.
Then he poured water into a basin
and began to wash the disciples’ feet.”
During supper? Jesus’ last meal, the meal that instituted the Eucharist—during this meal—Jesus got up from the table to wash his disciples’ feet.
He tells them why:
“So when he had washed their feet
and put his garments back on and reclined at table again,
he said to them, ‘Do you realize what I have done for you?
You call me ‘teacher’ and ‘master,’ and rightly so, for indeed I am.
If I, therefore, the master and teacher, have washed your feet,
you ought to wash one another’s feet.
I have given you a model to follow,
so that as I have done for you, you should also do.’”
Jesus washed Judas’ feet. And Peter’s.
He knew their betrayals. AND he washed their feet.
He confronted both Judas and Peter at dinner. AND he washed their feet.
He gave all the disciples beautiful words about preparing a place for them and their need to love one another. AND he washed their feet.
He made them priests and apostles. AND he washed their feet.
What does it mean to wash feet? Why would Jesus interrupt the Last Supper, the First Eucharist, to do it?
I learned something new about washing one time, when I took a hard fall. I tripped over my own feet and fell nose first onto asphalt. As I checked myself and discovered that everything was still attached and still moved, I suddenly had a new understanding of the people I take communion to. Down there on the ground I gained a new perspective.
Several of them live in an assisted living facility. Three of our little Catholic group have fallen and broken a hip. One was then transferred to a nursing home in another city. One died. A third recently returned after a couple of months at a rehab nursing home. Falls terrify each one in the group with good reason. In an instant life can change forever.
On Tuesday when we met for our weekly Catholic Devotions, I talked about my fall and the new understanding I gained of the fragility of their lives and health from being “down under”.
When all your body parts move, function, and generally make it possible for you to live, it is hard to fully appreciate what a gift God gives us in being able go about the business of living every day.
Last week, as I moved very slowly, I remembered how hard it used to be to go shopping with my mother and her octogenarian sisters. A trip to the drug store could take two hours. Making a stop in the bathroom could take 30 minutes. I had to force patience.
I would finish an outing and go do something very fast. I had to move at the pace of youth!
I was being generally good to Mother, Aunt Josephine, and Aunt Bertha—but I was NOT washing their feet.
To wash feet you’ve got to get down on the ground. Not just physically, but psychologically and spiritually. You’ve got to be where people are—but lower—when you serve them.
That is the lesson I think Pope Francis sought to lead us toward: BE WITH. BE WITH in a serving, lower than role. BE WITH where feet smell and just might kick. BE WITH long enough to catch the smell, to wear it like a perfume.
When you choose to wash feet, you choose to serve from a point of appreciation of the value and dignity of the other. What might have been sympathy or pity moves toward empathy and solidarity. Judgment fades. Love, even of the lesser parts, emerges when you kneel to wash feet.
While considering all this I thought of another reason that Pope Francis may have for choosing to wash the feet of prisoners and others on the edges of life:
It comes from another conversation Jesus had with his disciples during Holy Week. It was his description of the Last Judgment. “For whatsoever you did to the least of my brothers, you did unto me.”
When Pope Francis washes feet of those on the edges of salvation and life—he is washing the feet of the least of these. He is washing the feet of Jesus.
To wash feet, you have to go down. When I went down on the asphalt, I learned better how to wash feet—to serve from a position of weakness, rather than strength.
To serve the “least of these” from a position of weakness, to wash the feet of those who hurt or betray me, to confront in a way that is subservient, rather than self-righteous, to preach with a smile while holding a towel and sitting on the floor—that challenges my practice of Christianity.
Prayer:
Lord, as I enter into the Mysteries of the Triduum, help me to come with a towel around my waist. Show me where and when to use it as I follow you, not only to Gethsemane and Golgotha, but beyond to my family, parish, and neighborhood. Amen.
