A new perspective

Michele Marr

Seven years ago, Donna Rustvold was new to Sts. Simon and Jude. She

came to the parish with eight years experience as the director of

liturgy at her previous church, an experience that had drawn her,

more and more, to the work of social justice and concern for the

poor.

So when she heard about a trial run of JustFaith, a pioneering

curriculum designed to teach social justice and action to

parishioners, offered at the parish that year during Lent, Rustvold

signed up.

Over the course of six weeks the program opened her eyes to

conditions in the world, and conditions in her heart she’d never seen

before.

“I had never thought of myself as rich,” Rustvold said. “I was

always wanting more and better. I compared myself to those who were

better off and I wanted what they had.”

During the course of the JustFaith program, she read about the

circumstances of people throughout the world. She prayed. She read

Scriptures in which she heard the call for justice.

In the end, she experienced what she now describes as an “ah-ha”

moment. She saw that she was rich compared to so many people in the

world, in our country and even in her city.

“Like the rich man in [the story told] in Luke 16, I walked past

Lazarus, those in great need, without even seeing them and when I did

see them, I ignored them,” Rustvold said. The revelation left her

wondering how to respond.

To begin to answer that question, Rustvold completed the full,

30-week course of JustFaith. She then supported the program in

successive years and now, for the fourth year, she is a facilitator

of the program at Sts. Simon and Jude.

A man named Jack Jezreel developed JustFaith while he was the

parish social minister for a church in Louisville, Ky. His goal was

to create a curriculum that would call, challenge, nurture and

empower church members to care for the poor and the vulnerable -- to

be instruments of social transformation and justice.

“One of the best kept secrets of the Catholic Church is its social

teachings. That’s Jack’s passion, to bring it to the forefront,” said

Dee Wallace, who is facilitating JustFaith with Rustvold this year.

It’s Wallace’s passion, too. On her sweater she wears an enameled

pin bearing the words of Pope Paul VI, “If you want peace, work for

justice.”

Any adult, Catholic or not, can participate in JustFaith, which

begins each September and ends in May, but its not a program for the

faint-hearted. The program aims to transform people’s hearts -- to

change the way they live.

Joyce Cottage, who holds a master’s degree in theology, described

JustFaith as “provocative and disturbing, in the way the crucifixion

is provocative and disturbing, but also, in the end, rewarding.”

“It was shattering,” Cottage said.

It dismantled long-held beliefs about consumer economics and the

generally materialistic way of life in the U.S., she said. It got her

to listen to the stories of the poor, the people living on the short

end of the economic stick.

“Jesus never said, go and be safe, go and be comfortable, go and

be reasonable,” Cottage said. “We cannot get to the new life he

envisioned for us without going through some things that are life

changing.”

Participants agree to attend 30 once-a-week meetings. They pray.

They watch videos that explore social issues.

They read 10 books, 50 to 60 pages of reading each week from books

like Ron Sider’s “Rich Christians in an Age of Hunger,” Michael

Schut’s “Simpler Living, Compassionate Life,” and Eknath Easwaran’s

“Gandhi the Man, The Story of His Transformation.” Then they discuss

them.

They participate in hands-on experiences that bring them

face-to-face with people who are homeless, imprisoned or refugees.

They attend several retreats. So far, 57 people have completed the

program and another 12 embarked on the journey this year.

Scott Mather, program manager for the Society of St. Vincent de

Paul Institute for Conflict Management, a position that requires him

to be clear-sighted, compared the experience to “having cataracts

removed from my eyes.”

He recalls attending the weekly meetings with “apprehensive

gladness,” apprehensive about the changes he’d be compelled to make,

gladness for the what those changes would ultimately bring to his

work, to his life and to the lives of others.

He learned to listen to others, he said, in a new and

life-changing way.

For Rustvold and Wallace, and for those who complete JustFaith,

change is what they seek. Change in the world toward justice, justice

for all, and through that justice, peace.

* MICHELE MARR is a freelance writer from Huntington Beach. She

can be reached at [email protected].