TRUE PEACE DEMANDS JUSTICE

XXX SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME: Ex 22:20-26

This past Friday, we celebrated 50 years of the independence of Zambia, in which people have enjoyed peace. As we rejoice in the independence of Zambia, we are given in the first reading of this Sunday’s liturgy some basic rules, which must guide the nations, which want to live in peace.

The book of Exodus tells the story of liberation and of the journey to freedom of the people of Israel. While telling the story of the struggle for freedom, the book sets out some basic rules, which must be accepted like a charter or a constitution, making sure that all policies and laws remain faithful to it. 

This Sunday’s passage - Exodus 22:20-26 - deals with three basic issues:

1. the status of the foreigner or minorities
2. the care due to the orphan and the widow
3. the lending or borrowing of money.

The rights of minorities

According to Exodus, the foreigner must be treated like the citizens of the country. The Israelites are reminded that once they live in foreign land, being oppressed and enslaved. Remembering that suffering, they must treat all residents in the country as free people. The rights of minorities must be respected, and vulnerable groups must be protected. 

Nowadays, in many countries, we can see minorities being harassed and oppressed. These days, in Syria and Iraq, Christians, Curds and other minorities have to flee for their lives, being reduced to refugees in their own country, without a home where to rest and without food to give them strength and keep them alive. The foreigner who lives in our midst, is always a challenge to our exclusivism and fundamentalism. He forces us to see alternatives to our ways of thinking and living.

The orphan and the widow

In many traditional societies and in the modern ones as well, the orphans and the widows live at the mercy and goodwill of relatives and neighbours. In the Zambian traditional society, the orphans would find a home among the relatives, being brought up as their own children; the widows would be provided for with a second marriage within the family of the deceased spouse. However, as the traditional society and values collapse, we can find many orphans abandoned to themselves, struggling to survive. The State must protect and defend the rights of the orphan and of the widow. 

And Exodus leaves a strong warning: Do not abuse them, because if they cry out to me, I will listen to them “and your wives shall become widows and your children orphans” (Ex 22:24).

Interest on a loan

Finally, the passage deals with lending and borrowing, forbidding interest on loans to the poor. And anything taken in pledge as a guarantee of payment must be given back, because the poor may have nothing else which he relies upon to survive.

For our capitalist society, this rule sounds like a joke. Banks get their huge profits from lending, and in the compounds of our towns, people lend money at exorbitant rates.

For a nation to live in peace, its laws must be based on justice and righteousness. This reading may help us to look back at our journey as a nation. The freedom that we enjoy must be measured by the attention we give to the weak and the vulnerable. Do we have laws that protect the orphan and the widow? Are the poor defended from the rapacity of the rich? Or do we allow them to become the trampling stones upon which the rich climb?

Let us commit ourselves to work for justice and peace.