Mother of Exiles (Midweek Message)

Mother of Exiles

Fr. Tony’s Midweek Message

July 3, 2019

A middle-aged American woman Jewish poet, Emma Lazarus (1849-87), in 1883 was asked to write a poem to help raise money for the building of a large stone pedestal for French sculptor Frederic Auguste Bertholdi’s monumental statue Liberty Enlightening the World, a gift to the people of the United States from the people of France to be erected on a small island in New York Harbor.  She wrote a short poem that begins by comparing the meaning of this monument with those of the ancient classical world, especially the Colossus of Rhodes.  For Lazarus, Liberty lifting her lamp to the world was seen as a beacon of hope and new life.  It stood in stark contrast with “brazen giant[s] … with conquering limbs astride from land to land.”  It was the opposite of the military glory, police-state  propaganda, and storied pomp of tyrants.  The poem, later cast in monumental typeface upon the pedestal, changed the meaning of Bertholdi’s work from the celebration of an abstract concept in political economy (“liberty” or “freedom”) to the very real concrete benefits offered by a system dedicated to personal opportunity, autonomy, and mutual responsibility welcoming the masses of people cast off by the older systems of the world.  The Statue of Liberty thus became a symbol of the most tangible expression of Freedom:  welcome and care of those in need.  

The New Colossus

Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.
"Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she
With silent lips. "Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

Because of Lazarus’ poem, the statue of Liberty is one of the few icons of our national life that has not been compromised and prostituted in support of power politics. 

Happy Fourth of July. 

--Fr. Tony+