Is life just a potluck dinner?

Homily

22nd Sunday in Ordinary Time C2

28 August 2022

+Augustine

St. Lawrence Catholic Campus Center at the University of Kansas

AMDG

Is life just a potluck dinner?

As strange as it may seem, I think Jesus' answer is yes.

In Luke's Gospel alone, there are 10 meal stories.  10!  What did Jesus do all the time?  Well, he was accused of being a glutton and drunkard.  He ate and drank with people a lot.  What is more, we know He did so with great intentionality.  Jesus asks us to notice things at dinner.

More often than not, these dinner stories that Jesus uses to describe the Kingdom of Heaven are baffling.  They go against social convention.  Correct me if I'm wrong, but at the end of today's story, Jesus tells us to host a potluck, where you're never sure what you're gonna get!

People ask me often what priests do all day.  Well, we're just like you.  We gotta eat.  How we eat, especially how we do dinner, says a lot if not everything about us.  Jesus set it up that way, in case you're not keeping up.

Yesterday, I had four meals!  The first was pathetic.  I was running behind schedule, so I did a 'sinky!'  I ate breakfast standing up over the sink, wharfing down a few calories all alone without relationship or intention.  

First lunch was with my nephew, who came into town with his girlfriend to talk about how to navigate a relationship with different faith backgrounds.  We really got into it!  The poor server - we hadn't even look at the menus in the first 45 minutes.  I apologized profusely, though this happens to me all the time.  This lunch was like most meals.  It's not ultimately what's for dinner, but who's for dinner.  Our deepest hunger is for meaningful conversation.

Let me skip ahead to dinner, which was supposed to be drinks, but ended up as a four hour dinner.  Again, I had to apologize to the server.  We were 90 minutes in before we ordered anything.  Mark me down as the worst customer ever.  Though maybe not, since at the end of the four hour conversation with a friend the server complimented us for talking so intensely for four hours without looking at our phones.  She noticed.

Let's return now to my 2nd lunch, which was truly a potluck, with college students!  Last Thursday I did an open patio at SLC and told students to BYOB.  A lot of them showed up with no beverage. Their excuse was they didn't know the acronym, or they thought the night might be a scriptures study so Bring Your Own Bible!  But I digress.

Having college students do a potluck is pretty risky. My grandma was likely rolling over in her grave, since potluck for college students likely means just an assortment of chips.  We probably could have been more organized. A-F brings salads, G-L a starch, M-R a protein and S-Z a dessert.  We didn't have all 4 food groups covered.  But you know what, it didn't matter.

Jesus instructs us to get a motley crue of vulnerable people together over a meal to share faith.  He tells us to go potluck. The only four essential food groups are the poor, the blind, the lame and the crippled.  So you have to make sure you have someone who is lost, someone who is broke, someone who is stuck, and someone who is sick.  It's not that hard.

Jesus promises to show up and to join his suffering, death and resurrection to the conversation.  He promises that all of reality and salvation will pass through this potluck party.

Turns out, life indeed is just a dinner potluck.

+mj