In Jesus’ time, learned scholars, closed off from the people, devised rules for the people to obey. Often using specialized language, the scholars asserted knowledge hidden from mere commoners. The learned rulers kept the people divided, arguing over minutiae about their rules. Jesus, on the other hand, spoke openly in public, conversing with whomever he met on his travels. He told stories with everyday symbols and metaphors, creating meaning for people to grow in wisdom and truth. In today’s Gospel Jesus pokes fun at learned rulers when he says of the mystery of God, “you have hidden things from the learned and the clever which you have revealed to the little ones.”
Learned rulers still convene for exclusion and still devise rules for common people to obey. They and their consorts still tell of hidden knowledge and keep the people divided, arguing over minutiae. The description is a match for conspiracy theories. Conspiracy theories do not help people to grow in wisdom and truth, especially about rulers and their divisions. That is because conspiracy theories are devised by rulers for division (QAnon, pizzagate, Birtherism, voter fraud, coronavirus as hoax, …). Rulers spawn them specifically to hinder wisdom and truth. What is the core wisdom and truth conspiracy theories hinder but can be known even by “little ones?” It is that a very real conspiracy is happening all around us, all the time, hidden in plain sight and done by rulers. It is their known rule over vast systems that cause suffering. Instead of people changing the systems, rulers and their consorts keep us quibbling in the muck of their minutiae. We need to change the very real conspiracy of supremacist Trump/GOP rulers who conspire against human rights, equality, racial harmony, and democracy, against competency reviews in judicial appointments and fair elections, against asylum seekers and immigrants. We need to change the very real conspiracy of capitalist Trump/GOP rulers who conspire against Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, the Affordable Care Act, and child nutrition programs, against corporate accountability and against oversight on retirement funds, on banks and on drug companies, against fair housing and fair labor practices, employee and disability benefits all of which lets Wall Street once again plunder Main Street. We need to change the very real conspiracy of violent Trump/GOP rulers who conspire against peacemaking, cease fire agreements, and the regulation of weapons; against science, vaccination, and pandemic response; against protection from poisons polluting our air and water including animal and nuclear waste. We are prohibited from changing these conspiracies hidden in plain sight by the flurry of minutiae from the rulers who devise or allow the theories. Rulers use lies, untruths, partial truths, innuendo, speculation, disinformation, enemy making, and more that cause division and set the conspiracy theorists on their wild goose chases. All the while, rulers hidden in plain sight conspire for our suffering and death.
“Who abides this hidden in plain sight truth, when life is far from astute, rather bent by human will and selfishness… disaster waits… I cannot abstain, cannot avert my eyes to what I see, and the catastrophe that has already begun… Warnings met with ambivalence, too much to lose for most.… make reality dull and boring, and people just focus on their lots… too invested in greed and more that just denies the truth… as new roads of self-interest open… I wish I could turn it off, not see what I see, but alas I cannot, and so in witness I believe the truth be told, and if perchance others can see… we can avert the strife already created and reverse this dark hold on reality.” (Hidden in Plain Sight Truth – Tony DeLorger)
Prayer: Spirit, inspire us for wisdom and truth.
Question: How can I be wise and truthful about all the harm hidden in plain sight?
July 05, 2020 Gospel Matthew 11:25-30 Fourteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time