...take nothing for the journey but a walking stick –no food, no sack, no money in their belts. They were, however, to wear sandals but not a second tunic.
In Australia, I lived with an elderly Franciscan priest who went back to his native Italy to visit his family. He wore his habit to the airport, and carried a brief case, which contained his breviary, a toothbrush, and small clothes. He returned three weeks later with the same luggage.
I admired his simplicity but could not imitate it. I didn't take a truckload when I went there, nor did I bring one back, but I had a steamer trunk and a couple of suitcases, and a carry-on, and my breviary. Forty years later, I still have the breviary.
If you can't take it with you, you can sure accumulate of lot of stuff to be left to someone else -- who will neither want nor need any of it, and will probably have it hauled away to Good Will, Saint Vincent de Paul, or the dump.
But I have learned to use my occasional transfers to shed stuff. When I left Prior Lake, MN after a ten-year assignment, I sent five boxes of books to the library, and three large garbage bags of clothing to Good Will; and an equal amount of books and clothes to the dumpster. And then I loaded a rental truck and drove to Mount Saint Francis. Arriving here, I threw more stuff in the dumpster as I asked myself, "Why did I bring all this?" Sixteen years later, I still have my breviary.
The Lord's first missionaries traveled light. When cloth was created on hand-worked looms and hand-sewn together, not many people owned much more than what they wore on any given day. Outerwear doubled as underwear. They didn't need suitcases for their suits. When most water arrived by bucket, they couldn't be bothered with daily bathing; body odor was not an issue unless you were dead.
Intrepid travelers went by foot. The Christian missionaries relied on their hosts for food and basic necessities. When, like Saint Paul, they fell ill, their new friends cared for them. If they were imprisoned for their preaching, the local church provided food -- and writing supplies to Saint Paul.
Their only luggage was the spoken word of God; there was no New Testament to carry about; and the Hebrew scriptures were too valuable to be toted from town to town. Those precious scrolls stay in the synagogue.
The Lord provided for his missionaries, as Jesus had assured them. Many missionaries of this twenty-first century still live that way; and they're very effective. They can't afford to sneer at the different lifestyles of their hosts when they depend so much on them. And so they also abandon the cultural baggage of their homelands as they travel to foreign lands.
As we move forward into the twenty-first century, and educate children who will see the twenty-second, we give them the Word of God. That endures forever. It's accompanied by sacred rituals, our sacraments. If the sacraments are always administered with material things -- bread, wine, oil, water, etc. -- those objects will be provided when the time comes.
We will not be remembered for the stuff we owned, nor even for the stuff we gave away. If we're remembered at all, it will be for the faith which our ancestors gave to us. We never owned it but we gave it freely to our descendants.
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I love to write. This blog helps me to meditate on the Word of God, and I hope to make some contribution to our contemplations of God's Mighty Works.
Ordinarily, I write these reflections two or three weeks in advance of their publication. I do not intend to comment on current events.
I understand many people prefer gender-neutral references to "God." I don't disagree with them but find that language impersonal, unappealing and tasteless. When I refer to "God" I think of the One whom Jesus called "Abba" and "Father", and I would not attempt to improve on Jesus' language.
You're welcome to add a thought or raise a question.