We have seen the tragedies of the past weeks--the miners in West Virginia as well as the oil rig workers in Louisiana. Ordinary people who were willing to work in the high risk jobs of our world. Some would say that they worked there for the money. I have come to believe that there is more to it than that . I believe there is a sense of common good still alive in our society.
There are many institutions filled with people who have lost the idea of common good. Common good has been replaced with greed. There is no compassion for anyone. It is about making all the money one can make. The sense of "fair profit" is foolishness of the past. The wreckage of broken lives destroyed by this attitude is evident in our world.
Jesus of Nazareth introduced the concept of the kingdom of God that is quite different. Jesus wanted all people to be healed. Jesus wanted all people to be fed. Jesus died so that the whole world could be saved. The common good was essential in Jesus' understanding of how God intended us to live. The vertical love of God for the individual has to become horizontal reaching out to those whom we live with. Even if it costs us.
Ordinary people live and work in what seems to be ordinary jobs but create the extraordinary world that you and I live in. And when they die in tragic accidents, maybe it is time for you and I to realize that they worked not for themselves but for the common good.
The common good is a blessing that God invites us to preserve. If we do not learn how to lose our lives, we will never truly live.
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