Dear St. Rita Families,

            First, I ask you to join me in prayer for the victims of the tragic plane crash this week at Reagan Airport, and for their families and friends. If you haven’t seen this clip of Fr. Edlefsen, pastor of Our Lady of Lourdes Parish in Crystal City, I encourage you to watch it. Secondly, I want to give you a brief update on the robbery of our poor boxes and candle boxes. I received a call last week from the police officer who has been assisting us, and he told me that APD was able to identify the thief. He also told me that the thief would not be a problem for us in the future, since before they could even put out a warrant for his arrest, he was detained and deported by ICE. That means that if he ever should enter the country again, he will have four warrants on him already, for the four separate times that he entered St. Rita Church to steal. Thank you for your prayers. We will be installing new poor boxes and candle boxes soon. In the meantime, you can donate through Parish Giving to either cause.

            Since we are on the topic of finances and the Church, perhaps this is a good opportunity to reflect a bit on tithing – everyone’s favorite topic! A tithe is, technically speaking, one tenth of one’s earnings, which may seem or feel like a lot, depending on one’s financial status or habit of giving. It certainly highlights God’s seriousness when He commands a sacrificial gift. Interestingly, the tithe as such is never directly commanded in the New Testament. Old Testament references are plentiful, but the New Testament limits itself to Old Testament references, and the command from Our Lord to give not just money or material things, but one’s whole self.

            The difference in approach does not need to alarm us, but it does invite us to look at the purpose of tithing. A “rule” of 10% of your income would certainly be sacrificial, but there is something more or less simple about doing it that way, and perhaps even deceptive. Remember Our Lord’s parable about the tax collector and the Pharisee. The Pharisee thanks God that he is “not like other men,” and that he pays tithes on his “whole income” (Lk 18:11-12). But it is the tax collector who, humbling himself before God, goes home justified, not the Pharisee. In other words, as your pastor, I can’t just tell you to tithe more, or fully. I’m not fundamentally in the business of running a parish, even though it’s part of my responsibility. Rather, the ministry that has been entrusted to me is your justification, your righteousness, your salvation.

The way I like to say it is this: God doesn’t need your money (see Mt 17:24-27), but you need to give it! I could be clearer also, however. God is counting on you to enable ministry to happen in the parish, so do not think that because God can get money from the mouth of a fish if He wants to, that you are…off the hook! Remember Mordecai and Esther. When the lives of the Jewish exiles were threatened, Mordecai challenges Queen Esther, a Jew, to approach the King on their behalf. When she balks, Mordecai says to her, “Think not that in the king’s palace you will escape any more than all the other Jews. For if you keep silence at such a time as this, relief and deliverance will rise for the Jews from another quarter, but you and your father’s house will perish. And who knows whether you have not come to the kingdom for such a time as this?” (Esther 4:13-14). The invitation to put ourselves and even our livelihood on the line for God and His Church is for the sake of deliverance and salvation for the People of God, and it also has implications for ourselves! We must accomplish the mission that Christ has given to us, and insofar as that mission involves tithing, we must consider it germane to our relationship with God.

God, as you know, is never outdone in generosity, and He knows very much how to make your gifts to Him and His Church redound to your own benefit. Christ came to earth as a poor man, in a poor family, utterly relying on His Father. We, who are sons and daughters of God – what have we to fear? Therefore, do not be afraid to tithe in the full sense of that word. Whether it all comes to the parish, or some goes to the BLA or some other charitable organization, is up to you. But it is the generosity of heart, the good will, the willingness to go without a little for the sake of the Gospel, that counts. The Lord does not ask you to become destitute, and you need to take care of your family (after all, without you, your kids are poor), which means that 10% may be too much for you. So, be prudent in your decision, but do not afraid to be generous and even bold.

And if you are tempted to think that your minimal gift won’t do much for anyone or anything, you have only to look at the story of the widow and her 2 mites. Our Lord praises her! “Truly I tell you, this poor widow has put in more than all of them; for they all contributed out of their abundance, but she out of her poverty put in all the living that she had” (Lk 21:3-4). 

In Christ,

Fr. Christensen