Feast of St. Bonaventure

I was asked to share a reflection today, on the Feast of St. Bonaventure. We used Matthew 5:13-16 as the Gospel and this is what I shared:


People ask me why, of all things, I study theology and I’m never able to provide a short answer, but it almost always starts with the same story:

The summer before my senior year of high school, I spent several weeks building a school in the Dominican Republic. Soon after the ten of us students arrived in the DR, Fr. Terry Brennan, SJ, our high school Spanish teacher, led us on a tour of Santo Domingo. We took in the beautiful capitol city via a nice, big, air-conditioned van. The tour was quite pleasant until we headed for the city dump. Here, in a place called Cien Fuegos (or “100 Fires”) we passed through heaps of perpetually burning trash. I remember staring at all that garbage and just being amazed by all the things people had thrown away and wondering if I could find a way to breathe without inhaling the awful stench.

I couldn’t imagine why we had come to this place until I began to recognize that I wasn’t just looking at piles of garbage, but little tiny homes made of cardboard, corrugated metal, clothes, and old appliances. We turned a corner and suddenly we were upon a group of kids at play. It almost didn’t register: people lived here. Children lived here.

The van slowed to a halt and Fr. Brennan told us to get out. What? No. Not us. A bunch of white American teenagers. What on earth would we say or do? No sooner than the van had stopped than all the children fled. They disappeared into their garbage homes. We were all alone. Fr. Brennan insisted: get out of the van and walk around. I couldn’t believe my ears.

Reluctantly, self-consciously, awkwardly, we got out of the van. What we thought smelled bad before, we realized had actually been masked by the air conditioning. The searing heat and revolting stench almost took my feet out from under me. We took a few timid steps away from the van, and soon, the voices returned.

The children – previously partially or completely naked – returned wearing clean clothes and gigantic smiles. They grabbed our hands and asked us to play with them. Several children began climbing my arms and legs and instantly made me a human jungle gym. All I could think about was the way they smelled and how skinny they were … and how they just never stopped smiling. These children shared their salt and light with us in such a way that we forgot we were in a garbage dump.

That is, until a man came up to Fr. Brennan and asked us to follow him to his home. We hadn’t the foggiest idea why. But he took Father by the hand and marched us through the dump, past little tiendas selling chips and soda and cigarettes, past the ditches oozing with rainbow-spotted water and food scraps where children washed and collected water. And then he invited us into his home, a tiny little shanty, not six feet tall, separated in half by a close-line with rags and blankets draped across it. To the right were heaps of old clothes, bunched up to make a mattress and some pillows for him, his wife, and children. To the left, on the dirt floor, a single table and chair looked rather lonely. And then the man pointed to the wall, where a framed picture of the Sacred Heart of Jesus was displayed. The man held out his hands, smiled, and said, “Hermanos, rezemos: Brothers, let us pray.”

On a trip where we had been sent to serve and give, we were served and given an earth-shattering opportunity to behold what faith, hope, and love looks like and feels like firsthand.

This story is especially meaningful for me today as we celebrate the Feast of St. Bonaventure, whose legacy is one of both piety and learning. That man and those children in Cien Fuegos could have been embarrassed, afraid, jaded, or angry. They could have ignored us, written us off, and assumed that we wanted absolutely nothing to do with them. But that man’s piety – in such a desperate and disgusting place – was a bold and moving demonstration of his salt and light … and has served as the inspiration for my own piety and learning.

For Bonaventure, piety and learning were more than goods to be pursued in their own right; instead, when applied to each other, they serve a greater good: our piety constantly enriches our learning of the depth and breadth of God’s love and our learning enhances our piety such that our love for God builds and grows and overflows through love for one another.

In much the same way, as we find in today’s Gospel, salt and light are goods in and of themselves and accordingly, when Jesus calls us the “salt of the earth” and “the light of the world” it is at once both purposeful and powerful. Salt was and is used as a spice and preservative; because it was so valuable, it was used as currency. Here Jesus tells us that we are valuable, precious, and in-demand. Much like light. In our day and age, where, with the flip of a switch we can light up an entire building, stadium, or city block, we’re a bit removed from the millennia when people rose with the sun each dawn and worked until the last rays of light at dusk. The darkness left people unable to work, read, or visit; it left them feeling vulnerable and afraid of whatever or whomever prowled about at night. Light provided protection against hidden dangers or obstacles; it served as a beacon to guide a weary one home; and if need be, it prolonged the day so more work could be done.

And this point – about work – is what we cannot miss today. In this passage which immediately follows the Beatitudes in Matthew’s Gospel, when Jesus says, “You are the salt of the earth … You are the light of the world,” this is not the same as the ideals we are given in the Beatitudes for directions for how we “ought” to live or a way of saying “This is what you can be if you try really hard …” Even today, in this place, Jesus looks you in the eye and says, “Yes, you. YOU! Just as you are. Already. YOU are salt. You are light.”

But this is more than a pat on the back; it’s also a kick in the pants because today’s Gospel is not only about who we are, but what we do with who we are. In other words, our identity as salt and light is tied up with our mission to be disciples. And in Matthew’s Gospel, discipleship is more than just piety and learning; discipleship means doing what Jesus does: teaching and healing.

We teach and heal as salt and light and when we apply our salt and light, we serve a greater good. Our salt brings spice to the ordinariness of life; it promotes gratitude and generosity in a world turned in on itself. Our salt cultivates perseverance in the face of adversity or persecution; it provides the spunk for continuous conversion and challenging the status quo. Our light exudes comfort, peace, and hope in a world that has grown irritable, discouraged, and doubtful. And just as brilliant as our collective light can be when we gather together, so also a single, unflinching flicker can be most poignant and profound when surrounded by the bleakest, deepest darkness.

Our salt sustains us and the light we bear ensures that no matter the hour of day or night, the time is always right to roll up our sleeves and get to work. What is more, when Jesus says “You are the light of the world” and “You are the salt of the earth,” he is not just talking to you or me, but to you and me; indeed, to all of us. This plural “you” conveys a mission of not just service, but solidarity: sharing our salt, spreading our light, and inviting others to do the same. This means looking for and finding the salt and light in every single person we meet and in places we might not expect it – even a garbage dump in the Dominican Republic – and making use of that salt and light to teach and heal, to be taught and be healed.

Today, as we hear Jesus affirm us as salt and light, let us also pay heed to the challenge that our salt and light must reach out and be put to use always and everywhere – but especially where the world needs it the most.

You never know what piety and learning it could inspire.