Because I’m worth it — greed and generosity in an age of materialismA sermon given at All Hallows by Anna Davie on 9 November 2003When I read this passage in Mark’s Gospel, I thought ‘What on earth is Jesus going on about here? Why does he see it as a good thing that this poor widow gives away all that she has to live on?’ It seemed a bit daft to me. I had visions of one of those money advice gurus being called in to help her budget. He is sat next to her watching a video of her putting the coin in the box and saying to her ‘Now, Rebecca, what was going on there?’ It also made me think about something I read in a book called The Little Book of Complete Bollocks, which is a kind of parody of all those self-help books. There’s this part called ‘Letting Go’:
Then in brackets it says ‘Talk to a friend before embarking on this.’ But I read this passage in Mark a few times and thought about it. Jesus says:
And it occurred to me that what Jesus may be talking about here is social justice, wealth, status and inequality. He is contrasting that self-righteous, showy hypocrisy of the powerful with the way the powerless so often give of themselves without making any great show of it. Jesus gathers the disciples together and tells them: ‘I tell you that this poor widow put more in the offering box than all the others.’ It seems to me that what Jesus may be highlighting here is this attitude of giving of yourself, your whole self, without reward. It’s as if he is saying that what matters is the wholeness of that offering, and not the grasping after things that make us feel better, that fill that hole, that display our worthiness. When I was thinking about what Jesus said about the law-givers and the way their display of generosity in their long robes is contrasted with the offering of the widow, I kept thinking about that advert that always ends with ‘because I’m worth it’. Something about it really gets to me, and I think it’s the implication inherent in it that some people are not ‘worth it’. And it sort of sums up for me what I struggle with about the materialistic culture in which we live — the way we are continually bombarded with images of worth based on a certain kind of beauty, and how in order for some to have material things, in order to sell us these illusions, it is always necessary for some to not have them and be implicitly portrayed as unworthy of whatever it is. In order for this to continue, a whole culture has to be built on the idea of worthiness — who deserves justice, freedom, happiness and material security. I think that’s what Jesus was trying to show the disciples: the emptiness and hypocrisy of a society built on this display of goodness in which people are actually being robbed. The punishment he speaks of is, I think, about living a lie. I don’t think that what he is saying is ‘give all your worldly goods away’ or ‘give everything you have and leave yourself with nothing’. I think what he is illuminating here is the difference between the emptiness of these lies and the truth of what really matters in life. I think what he may be saying here is that what matters in life is love. And this love is always about social justice, not just for some but for all. The widow gives all she has because she does not see herself as an individual divisible from everyone else, and she makes no show of it because she has nothing to prove. I think maybe what Jesus is saying here is that whilst this may appear like a foolish or dangerous act, this total giving is what God is like. That God loves like a woman who has no status, no power, no need to impress, and simply gives without counting the cost. The God of Israel who imparted judgements and laws, and demanded these displays of piety, is not the God Jesus points us towards. It is this womanly pouring out of compassion in the shadows of power, hidden, unseen, but pointed to by him — ‘look at her’. Whilst I was thinking about this story, I watched a documentary about the rising levels of gun crime and gang murders amongst young black men in this country, and one scene of the documentary involved a middle-aged black woman living on a run-down estate in London who welcomes some of the young guys from the estate into her home and listens to them. She said that there were many things which they needed, but most of all what she tried to give them was love. This woman spoke of her sorrow, and it reminded me of Jesus pointing towards the widow and the enormity of her sacrifice, as if he was saying that love like that does cost us everything. It demands that we give of ourselves, all of ourselves, and connect deeply with others, and that inevitably this brings great sorrow. We suffer. When we love like that it is humbling and painful. It puts us in touch with our own woundedness and poverty. It seems to me that the ‘because I’m worth it’ culture of greed and inequality we live in robs us of these deeper connections. It acts as a substitute for love. It sells us lies that we are somehow unlovable unless we endlessly consume, and then some of us will be worth it. In the Old Testament reading we heard earlier from 1 Kings, Elijah says ‘Do not worry, the bowl will not run out of flour or the jar run out of oil before the day that I, the Lord, send rain.’ Elijah tells us that we already have all that we need. If we continue to distrust this bountifulness we become fearful and greedy, and it is this which leads to the exploitation of the natural resources of the world and creates poverty. The widow in Mark shows no fear or greed. She gives as God gives, not in half measures. This kind of bountifulness acknowledges that all life is connected. Feeling that connectedness in our hearts and souls can free us from that fear and anxiety, and release us into the arms of God, who tells us ‘do not worry’ and ‘look at her’. I think one of the greatest lessons I was ever taught was by a psychotherapist who practises a form of therapy and group work called Process work. In Process work, as in many other belief systems and ways of seeing the world, everything is seen as connected, and this teacher, Jean-Claude, said to us in a class once ‘Whoever you are working with, you are working with yourself.’ Applied to what I am trying to say here, I think Jesus was trying to convey a similar concept in pointing to what he saw in the society around him. We are the other. We are who we condemn or belittle. Our neighbour is not divisible from ourselves. If we only love ourselves with tokenistic gestures and pamper ourselves with leftovers, that is not the generous love that does not count the cost which Jesus points us towards. If we feel ‘I am worth it’, and must prove it by consuming more than we need and trying to fill up some emptiness within, then others are condemned to a sense of worthlessness and poverty. Our inner poverty and the poverty we see around us are deeply connected. They both require love and justice. The work of justice begins here within us. It requires us to love what we consider to be unlovable in us. It calls us to love ourselves in the midst of our inner violence and woundedness. Jesus speaks of a woman who loves with everything she has. Over and over in the Gospels we encounter women who pour out that love, without fear, without counting the cost.
We are called to love ourselves and one another. We are called to bear witness to social injustice. Jesus called the disciples to witness what the poor widow had done, knowing that they too knew poverty in their lives. I think Jesus was speaking very directly to the poor in these passages. Firstly he was saying, I think, ‘You have been robbed by social injustice. These people who lord it over you are ripping you off and taking all the credit for appearing to be generous, but I know how you give to one another and God sees it too.’ I think Jesus saw, as many of us have seen, the incredible compassion and generosity people in poverty very often show towards one another. There is that sense of being connected in suffering, and knowing you are one of many, that brings out this love in people for one another. Anyone who has ever worked or lived amongst communities in struggle knows this spirit and never forgets it, and I don’t just mean amongst the so-called respectable poor. Some of the greatest generosity, kindness, wisdom and love I have ever seen and experienced has come from some of the most despised in our society — thieves, prostitutes, drug addicts and prisoners. All of them struggling with cruelty and self-destruction, as many of us do, but so often beautiful and great in spirit. ‘Look at her’, Jesus said. The revolutionary Che Guevara said:
This is the kind of love Jesus is talking about in these passages in Mark, it seems to me. The kind of love that does not weigh up whether someone is worthy of receiving it, whether someone deserves justice or compassion, but feels it towards everyone, whoever they are. The American writer Rita Mae Brown said:
Jesus points us towards a woman without power or status, who makes no show of her generosity, and he says ‘look at her’. It seems to me that what is calling us to be is both lovers and revolutionaries, people who can give up the power play and the moral superiority and who can accept that true happiness is not found in what we can buy or steal, but in what we can let go of, in what we can give of ourselves, in what we offer to this world. As Adrienne Rich said:
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