Saturday of the Third Week of Advent

Lectionary 198

He has filled the hungry with good things,
and the rich he has sent away empty.

The American Psychiatric Association has recently listed hoarding in its DSM (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders). Hoarding has been defined in various way, but here is one:

• The acquisition of, and failure to discard, possessions that appear to be of useless or of limited value;
• Living spaces so cluttered that using the room as intended is impossible;
• Significant distress or impairment to function.

Calling hoarding a mental illness should come as no surprise. Mental illness is usually an individual's expression of what the entire culture suffers. If the culture is insecure, millions will be so anxious they can't sleep, eat, work or lie down. If the culture is jaded by too much excitement and dreads sorrow, the mentally ill suffer depression. If the culture believes the old DuPont slogan, "Better living through chemistry," you can bet on a pandemic of drug addiction. A culture that trashes the Sacrament of Marriage will have sexual paraphilia with more species and sub-species than the Saint Louis Zoo. 

Hoarders acquire more stuff than they know what to do with, and cannot let it go. Everyone knows someone like this. I knew one fellow who never threw any mail away until he had opened and read it. He was several years behind! When he died the family had to go through the pile, paying his unopened bills and cashing his unsigned checks. I knew a woman who saved dirt in her one-room apartment, along with all her garden implements. I helped clean out a fellow's home that was stacked with newspapers to the ceiling. 

But hoarders only do what we tell them to do: "Treasure stuff!" And the Hoarders' National Holiday is Christmas. Let's all give each other stuff until it overflows our houses! 

Common sense will tell you, "If you consistently put things into a limited space and take nothing out, it will fill up, fill out, and overflow." In other words, every time you get something new, you have to discard something old. That means, when you give someone  a gift, you might not be doing a favor; because he might not have anything of less value to discard! 

Now there's a Christmas conundrum worthy of Doctor Seuss! What do the Whose of Whoville do when the Grinch gives them too much stuff? Do they say, "Go away! No thanks! We cannot keep any more?" 

Today we hear the song of the impoverished woman who, when she bore a son, laid him in a manger. Her only treasure was faith, which may have infinite value in some places but cannot be banked or borrowed against. She managed to provide swaddling clothes for the infant, but no secure roof. And when trouble approached, she fled with him into a foreign country where she knew no one except her faithful husband. 

Mary's only treasure was God and because of her we celebrate God's mercy to us. 


Yesterday, after a week of silence, the NRA made a statement in response to the Connecticut massacre. They propose that Congress should sponsor armed guards in every school in the United States. It is a declaration of war. They do not intend to back down even an inch, but rather to march forward into the schools. Who will protect the children from their guards when the guards go berserk?