Monday of the Thirty-first Week in Ordinary Time
Today the church honors the saint of the broom. When good Pope John (XXIII) canonized Martin de Porres, the Holy Father gave him that title. Martin’s nickname among his Dominican brothers in Lima (Peru not Ohio) was “Brother Broom.” No task was too menial and all work was sacred to him. He viewed his service to his brothers as service to Christ.
Brooms and broomsticks represent many things. Some religions employ brooms to symbolically sweep away and cleanse. Perhaps recent Halloween visitors to your door carried broomsticks. Flying brooms are prominent in the popular Harry Potter books and movies. But brooms are not always so favored. Colin Hawkin’s classic children’s book Witches informs us that “the broomstick flying is dangerous, cold and uncomfortable. So most witches travel by bus, bicycle or car.” So much for preconceptions.
Brooms are found everywhere. Every house has a broom, from the White House, to your house. If we think ourselves above menial tasks, like cleaning with a household broom, the Lord may ask us about it. That’s why St. Paul writes that “all of us must give an account before God.”
We move through Luke’s Gospel in this year of Luke (which concludes at the end of this month). In a few days we will hear the Lucan parable of the woman who sweeps the house in search of a lost coin. When her broom uncovers the coin she throws a feast for guests from the highways and the byways. She wished to share her joy, the fruit from the lowly task of her broom.
Each of us, like brooms, sweep about in any number of ways. We sweep to seek out and find those who need us, as Saint Martin de Porres did. We sweep when we allow people in our lives to start over and make a clean start. And sometimes, unfortunately, we unlovingly sweep up dirt and dust on others in the form of gossip, harming ourselves and others.
How will we use our brooms?
—Timothy J. Cronin