Whom Would Jesus Want in His Cathedral?

Which should be priority of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Los Angeles: a new downtown cathedral or feeding the hungry and sheltering the homeless?

The difference between the archdiocese and the Catholic Worker group on this topic is the latest resurfacing of a tension between devotional craft and charity that has haunted Christianity from the beginning. It was there when Mary, whom many identify with the repentant prostitute Mary Magdalene, extravagantly poured expensive ointment over Jesus’ feet and was rebuked by Judas, the revolutionary zealot, who said it should have been sold and the money given to the poor. But in this case it was Mary whom Jesus commended, though this was the same Jesus who, in the great account of the final judgment in Matthew 25, said that those who had served him by helping the hungry and the homeless--not by implication, those who had built great churches--would enter the kingdom of heaven.

Yet certainly there were many hungry and homeless in the Middle Ages, and still it is difficult to wish the great medieval cathedrals had never been built. At the same time, those magnificent churches and abbeys served not only as places of worship, but also as places of shelter and refuge. Cannot the new cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels do the same?

I had a vision the other day. That is that every day, in the late afternoon, after the last service and the last prayer by a passerby has been said, and perhaps on Sundays and holy days as a whiff of incense still lingers in the air, the pews are pushed back, temporary tables and chairs are set up and a great meal in Catholic Worker style is served there to the poor and homeless. Then the tables and chairs are removed, mattresses and blankets are spread and the homeless, maybe in the scores or hundreds, spend the night under the sheltering arms of the great cathedral, to await an early breakfast.

I imagine most of the food would be donated, as it is now to the Catholic Worker or to Union Station in Pasadena. The guests served could and should do much of the manual work of setting up and cleaning up every day and night.

Of course there would be problems. Troublemakers, alcoholics and drug dealers would have to be dealt with. The program would require a substantial, competent staff, from custodians to security personnel to social workers and counselors prepared to give aid in changing the lives of those ready to receive help. Yet with $50 million raised for the building, another $5 million or so might be found to provide a permanent endowment for this. Together with many volunteers, I would hope the Catholic Worker community would be involved in the planning and execution.

What a magnificent symbol--and reality--of the two sides of Christian giving working together this would be. How proud Los Angeles as a city and the archdiocese as an institution ought to be of such a demonstration of the heavenly city here on Earth.

Naturally, there would be opposition. There may be worshipers who would rather not meet ragged, smelly, sometimes drunk or drugged or mentally unstable brothers and sisters in Christ around a place of worship or countenance the world out of which those disturbing persons come. Despite all possible security precautions, there will be worries about pickpockets, violence, unpleasant encounters. One can only ask what the church ought to be about and point out that the Roman Catholic Church has an apostolic tradition of centralized authority so that decisions in accordance with the mind of Christ that may be unpopular in some quarters or even financially costly nonetheless can be made.

Catholics believe that Jesus is present in the Blessed Sacrament on the altar. Given all that we know about him, whom would Jesus rather have banqueting at the table where he sits as host or around him through the long still hours of the night than the poor and homeless?