The Wheel of Fortune

Dear Friends,

We know that Wheel…of…Fortune…is one of our country’s most popular, longest running game shows. Viewers cheer wildly when a contestant accumulates gifts and money, and groan sympathetically when the wheel stops at Bankrupt.

Know where the wheel of fortune comes from? It’s an abbreviated form of today’s parable about the rich man and Lazarus. Many early medieval cathedrals in Europe have a wheel of fortune sculpted around the rose window. On the left, ascending side, the man is shown rising to wealth and prominence. At the top of the wheel, he is richly arrayed, but then on the descending side, he begins to fall into poverty and at the bottom, he ends up upside down with his toes sticking out of holes in his shoes or perhaps with no shoes at all – a graphic reminder that, although the world flatters the rich and powerful, material well-being is not automatically a sign of God’s favor or approval.

The rich man in today’s Gospel is not accused of specific injustices, but only of self-interest and self- indulgence, dressing elegantly and dining sumptuously every day. His sin was that he did not even recognize Lazarus’ longings, and perhaps even more seriously, did not even see Lazarus. He never noticed that Lazarus was there daily.

Self-absorption – reaching for the top of the wheel of fortune without regard for the poor stranger is a biblical theme that repeats itself in every age. Think Scrooge, for example, in The Christmas Carol. And in our day, think of the news commentators who encourage us in this voting season to put into office whoever will give them more money, a better lifestyle. For them, there is no need to think of Lazarus.

Suppose the American public did want to be faithful to Christ’s calling on behalf of the poor stranger? The situations are complex and vast. We feel paralyzed and desensitized. What can we do?

For one thing, we can register to vote if we haven’t done so, and we can vote for candidates and issues that will support and benefit the common good and the poor stranger. Voting can be a way of recognizing Lazarus. A second thing we can do is in our daily world. We can’t end the war in Ukraine or deal with the flooding and fires that strip people of their necessary possessions, but we can reach out a hand to the stranger in our neighborhood, in our own homes. SomeONE. Do we do that?

Another way of reading this Gospel is to recognize that Lazarus is within each of us. Lazarus – whom we ignore or don’t even see. There is the rich, valued part of us that we present to the world and there is the Lazarus in us that longs to be fed and recognized – the part of us we do not cultivate but which will be blessed by God when we come face to face.

The Lazarus in us is the part that has not succeeded, the addicted part of us, the part of us that lacks self esteem or haunts us in the night. Today’s Gospel tells us that our God values not just our successes but our very neediness, our woundedness, our need to be fed. Today, we are reminded that God’s love includes those parts of us that escape our best efforts – the Lazarus within us.

So, we celebrate Lazarus today. His name means “God is my helper.” As we try to make our world and ourselves more human, God is our helper.

~Sister Joan Sobala