Celebrating Jude, "Patron Saint Of Lost Causes"

Some time ago, our daughter gave me a St. Jude candle, her good humored way of ribbing me for some of my efforts, usually failed ones, at making the world a better place. It was a good reminder of my need for divine wisdom to more faithfully and effectively "go about doing good" as a follower of Jesus.

Jude, or Judas Thaddeus, one of the twelve disciples, was an early missionary and martyr who is revered in some traditions as "the saint of lost causes" or of "impossible causes", someone I can identify with.

Here's a list of some of my own favorite causes:

1. With many others, I've been writing, speaking, blogging and praying for a patient and Spirit-inspired unity in the church. But instead of celebrating a growing oneness resulting from allegiance to "one Lord, one faith and one baptism", Jesus' followers are splintering apart as never before, each claiming to faithfully represent the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.

2. I've long been a passionate advocate for peace and a strong opponent of war as a means of resolving problems, as have multitudes of others, but people of faith seem less and less willing to renounce war-making and other forms of violence, including more and more Christians advocating for their "gun rights" to protect themselves.

3. I'm continually harping on North American believers, including myself, assuming the right to more and more wealth and insisting on the comfort, convenience and extravagance of ever newer and larger homes, garages and clothes closets. Mostly to no avail.

4. I know not all marriages should last, as in cases where there is ongoing disrespect, infidelity, addiction and/or abuse, but I keep longing for all such wrongs to be made right and to have all relationships restored and fully healed. In our community, divorce rates have remained constant while the number of marriages has actually declined relative to our population growth.

5. The current refugee crisis is unprecedented, approaching nearly one in 100 displaced people in the world today. Efforts to raise money through having a table for cash donations at last year's Mennonite Relief Sale for MCC resulted in over $40,000 raised for refugee relief, but with some 10,000 present at the Sale, that's still the equivalent to the cost of about four glazed doughnuts each. We're not yet setting the world on fire with this effort.

6. I'm increasingly passionate about bringing about change in our criminal justice system, with a restorative and rehabilitative approach rather than primarily a punitive one. Yet in spite of the efforts of citizens all over the Commonwealth, Virginia has still not even reinstated parole, and of those who are still parole eligible (incarcerated before parole was abolished in 1995) only 13 were granted release in February, and only one of these was given a geriatric release. No women were in that number.

The list could go on.

But maybe these causes aren't all hopeless. Not if we remain in tune to God's vision for a new heavens and a new earth in which shalom will finally become the new norm.

So I may just keep a candle lit to remind myself that "faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen." At least not yet.