Some twenty years ago, when I taught basic research methods to college students, I gave my students the assignment to go to a restaurant to people watch. They were to observe diners at three tables, write down what they did, then return to class with a one-page paper comparing and contrasting what they saw. My goal was to arouse interest in observational research and to set the stage for learning how to do it.
Twenty years ago, students came back with observations that some people talked at dinner, some did not. They noticed expressions on faces, heated or quiet conversations, and interactions with waiters. Twenty years ago, cell phones were not developed enough that students would describe people sitting across the table from each other, but focusing on whoever or whatever was on their screen instead of that other person.
I was eating alone the other day and people watched. A majority of the diners I observed were spending lunchtime texting on their phones. Some sat with others, most were alone. Pretty much all of them were “self-absorbed”—they were focused on themselves and their phones, not the environment around them, not even people seated at the table with them.
Our culture today fosters self-absorption. Technology, habits we learned during COVID lock-downs, too much to do, too available instant gratification from a screen—all of this fosters self-absorption.
Self-absorption is not deliberate selfishness or sinfulness. But it is not a new way of being, and it can set the stage for not following God’s teaching about Rights and Responsibilities. That every person has a right to life and the necessities of living is a part of Catholic Social Teaching that goes back to the early days of the Church. Indeed, seeds of it were within Mosaic Law and the admonitions of the prophets. At the same time, from the first chapters of Genesis, God’s Word has always taught about Responsibilities—to God, family, community, and society.
Today, we look at the readings through this lens.
Malachi 1:14b-2:2b, 8-10
Malachi was a prophet to the Jews after they returned to Jerusalem from Babylon, but before Ezra’s reforms. He uses a literary form of dialogue between God and his people about six failures of the people to be faithful. The selection today is God’s unhappiness about the corruption of priests. That full accusation from God goes from Malachi 1:6 through 2:9. It is about carelessness in worship, sacrificing old, sick, or maimed animals, rather than the best of the herd. (God opposed this, starting with his correction of Cain in Genesis). Perhaps, in the poverty of the times, the priests were “self-absorbed,” thinking it better to keep the best of the livestock to reproduce. That was, again, a conflict God had had with his people for centuries. They were thinking of economics and self-sufficiency, rather than trusting God. They thought they knew best and apparently, as priests, taught others to be self-absorbed and practical. God said no.
Matthew 23:1-12
The plot thickens with Jesus and the religious leaders. The same conversation we have witnessed in the Gospel for weeks continues. In a few verses skipped for the Sunday sequence, Jesus asks the scribes and Pharisees a question which they can’t answer. (Matthew 22:41-45) Now, Jesus confronts them. The verses today are filled with “rights and privileges” they enjoyed as religious leaders. Widened phylacteries and lengthened tassels meant they literally “wore their love on their sleeve.” The phylacteries were small receptacles that carried the words of Exodus 13:9, 16 and Deuteronomy 6:8. They were signs of being a pious Jew. Jesus acknowledges on the outside they look like they are totally loyal to YHWH, but, inside their hearts, they were not YHWH’s loyal sons. They were self-absorbed. Worse, they put burdens of faith observance on others which, for the poor, made it very difficult to be purified enough to worship in the temple.
They were filled with their Rights, but, like the priests of Malachi’s time, they were negligent of their Responsibilities.
I Thessalonians 2:7b-9, 13
Paul describes the Christian leader way as following a different path—with a good result. Paul notes that he plied his trade as a tentmaker while he was with the Thessalonian community, so he could provide food and lodging for himself, rather than be a burden to them. He says he believes that is part of the good result. “With such affection for you, we were determined to share with you not only the gospel of God, but our very selves as well.”
Ah, yes, Paul and his fellow evangelists were not self-absorbed, but considerate of the resources and needs of the Thessalonian community.
Catholic Social Teaching: Rights and Responsibilities
The foundation principle of the inherent dignity of every person discussed last week carries over this week as the justification for human rights for every person. St. Pope John Paul II lists them in his encyclical Centesimus Annus: “the right to life, an integral part of which is the right of the child to develop in the mother’s womb from the moment of conception; the right to live in a united family and in a moral environment conducive to the growth of the child’s personality; the right to develop one’s intelligence and freedom in seeking and knowing the truth; the right to share in the work which makes wise use of the earth’s material resources, and to derive from that work the means to support oneself and one’s dependents; and the right freely to establish a family, to have and to rear children through the responsible exercise of one’s sexuality. In a certain sense, the source and synthesis of these rights is religious freedom, understood as the right to live in the truth of one’s faith and in conformity with one’s transcendent dignity as a person.” (Quoted in the Compendium of Catholic Social Teaching, 155)
These individual rights are extended to peoples and nations, although in our world, there is recognition that many peoples do not have them. (See Compendium of Catholic Social Doctrine, 156-159)
So, the church teaches that those of us who do enjoy our rights, have responsibilities. In fact, you could say that all of Catholic Social Teaching is about our responsibilities. The core of responsibilities was in last Sunday’s Gospel: “love your neighbor as yourself.”
To accomplish this, we must give up our habits of self-absorption. I will leave you today with a thought provoking quote from Dorothy Day:
“The greatest challenge of the day is to bring about a revolution of the heart, a revolution which has to start with each one of us.”
Prayer:
Where am I self-absorbed, Lord? Or my heart hardened? I do close myself off, sometimes. I’m done for the day. Don’t ever let me be done for the week or the month or the year. I am so very blessed to have all those rights St. Pope John Paul listed. All, Lord. Thank you! Help me be aware of the needs of others across the world and reach out by being aware of issues for developing countries, as well as contributing to organizations who help. But there are also those near me who do not have the same rights as me: they are bound by illness, poverty, fragile family structures, addiction, violence, hopelessness, isolation. Show me what I can do in my family, my parish, my community. Do not let me stay self-absorbed! Lead me, guide me, Lord!
