I go grocery shopping for the brothers once a week - a task that exhausts me to the very core of my being. Grocery shopping in Brazil is much like grocery shopping anywhere else I suppose, except, without warning some of the most basic items disappear from the shelves for up to a month. Double and triple checking an isle where I would usually find granola or ground beef (or whatever the surprise missing item happens to be) makes me dizzy. When I finally cave and ask someone who works there where the granola is, they go over with me and dig around for a half a minute before shrugging, "I guess we don't have any." Well, a few months ago when I got to the checkout line with my two helpers (we were buying a weeks worth of food and supplies for a rather hungry house of eight) all I could think about was how nice it would be to sit down. Inevitably, this was the moment our dear Lord chose to pay me a visit - for some reason He like to show up when I'm not on my A-game. This short middle-aged woman comes up to me, sniffling, trying to mumble something about being hungry and having not eaten in a long time. My gut always does a back-flip in these situations and a dozen thoughts or so race through my mind before I manage to take a deep breath and simply assess the situation. Why did this woman come up to me? Do people think that Religious are under some obligation to give money away? How did she get in this situation? Is she just going to use the money for drugs or alcohol? What do I do if her story is credible? What do I do if it isn't? ...
Well, this woman was different from others. She was visibly ashamed of having to ask me for help, she was weeping but couldn't even look me in the eyes - something that professional beggars are very good at. I'm still thinking to myself that I'm not going to give her any money since we are in a grocery store, so I ask her what she wants from me. She hands me three bags - a pound of rice, a pound of beans, and a pound of flour. Total cost of just under $5. I had the cashier ring it up, she thanked me profusely through her shame-filled tears and walked hurriedly out of the store and away. I watched her leave - astounded that she didn't come back in asking someone else for a bit of meat or something, which, had I been on my A-game I would have offered her.
I tell this story because poverty evokes many emotions, both in the poor and in those who encounter them. Some people are so overcome with the emotion of fear, that they avoid any possible encounter with the poor or poverty in general. Today's Gospel was about the rich young man who kept the Law from his youth. He asks Jesus what more he ought to do and Jesus tells him, "If you want to be perfect, go, sell what you have and give it to the poor, then come and follow me." It says that the young man went away sad for he had many possessions. It makes me think of the verse in St. Luke's Gospel, "Whoever has will be given more; whoever does not have, even what he thinks he has will be taken from him." (8:18) Though the immediate context of this verse is about listening and understanding of the mysteries of the Kingdom, we can also read something true about poverty: whoever has poverty will be given more happiness - "Blessed are you poor - for yours is the kingdom of God." Poverty isn't terrible, it is something that God blesses. Poverty is also associated with the simple life - St. Francis was seduced by Lady Poverty (and I think any of us who have read his life story have felt that same seduction). Jesus encourages us not to worry about our lives, about what we will wear, what we will eat or drink, about what we have to do to make it in the world. (Mt. 6:25-34) God takes care of the animals, does He not? So He has all the more reason to take care of we who are worth much more than the sparrow. Interestingly enough, Jesus begins that whole exhortation with this: "No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and wealth." (Mt. 6:24) Blessed are the poor - whoever has poverty will be given more happiness. This is the side of poverty that attracts us: abandon to divine providence, simplicity of life.
The refusal of poverty on the other hand -
whoever has not poverty - will result in the loss of happiness -
even what they think they have (happiness) will be taken from them. This is evident from the rich young man. He was missing only one thing to become perfect -
poverty. His possessions became a cause of sadness - he was unable to set them aside. No one can serve two masters - you cannot serve God and wealth. Embracing poverty opens the way to follow Christ -
sell what you have and give it to the poor, then come and follow me. Pharaoh refused to free the children of Israel - had he embraced the poverty to which God was calling him (the God of Joseph, who understood and interpreted the previous Pharaoh's dreams and brought about Egypt's domination) certainly God would have blessed him. But what stands written is very much the contrary -
even what they think they have will be taken away from them - "Pharaoh’s servants said to him, 'How long will this man be a snare to us? Let the men go, that they may serve the LORD their God. Do you not realize that Egypt is destroyed?'" (Ex. 10:7) How hard it is for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven, it would be easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle. The other side of poverty, the part we fear, is misery and the suffering that comes from want. Yet if we do not courageously confront misery and suffering (by being compassionate and receiving mercy), we cannot embrace poverty; and if we do not embrace poverty, our happiness (or what we think is our happiness) will be taken away.
There have been long discussions in the history of the church about whether the poverty we are called to live as Christians is material or spiritual in nature. I think it is interesting to notice through the scriptures that the two are constantly mixed together. Yet at the same time, if we are attentive, those whom the Scriptures designate as poor are not always who we would think. Take a look at the story of Hagar and her son Ismael whom Sara finally kicks out of the house (Gn. 21:15-21). Abraham gives them some bread and a skin of water and sends them out into the wilderness - the desert. Of course, in the middle of the desert with no where else to go, the water gets used up and we read that Hagar sticks her son under some bushes and gets far enough away that she can't hear him cry. She doesn't want to hear him cry or see him die of thirst, she herself begins to lift up her voice and weep. She gets a visit from an angel who asks her, "What is the matter with you, Hagar? Do not fear, for God has heard the voice of the lad where he is..." (Gn. 21:17)
We know from the psalms, "The Lord hears the cry of the poor." (Ps. 34) We would be tempted to say, "Yes, this poor mother, at her wits end, is truly poor - she has nothing and cannot even prevent her child from dying of thirst. God will certainly hear her cry." But the scriptures have a surprisingly different outlook - God did not hear Hagar's cry, He heard the child's cry. A child cries because he knows he will be heard by those whom he depends upon. When an adult cries however, it is often much more complicated than that - sadness that has become despair, losing control, feeling violated, anger turned rage. Hagar cries because she has given up, she has gone into despair and lost all hope. She is so certain of death, and so saddened by it, that she prefers not to even show a mother's compassion and be with her son in what she thinks are his final moments - she tries to forget him. It almost makes you think that Isaiah had this specific incident in mind when he wrote, "Thus says the Lord, 'Can a woman forget her nursing child and have no compassion on the son of her womb? Even these may forget, but I will not forget you.'"(Is. 49:15) True poverty recognizes that our being is a pure gift, and because of that, whatever we receive in our life is also a pure gift. True poverty is recognizing, through all life's circumstances, that the only thing worth possessing in the end is God. Job is a great witness to that, "The Lord giveth, and the Lord taketh away; blessed be the name of the Lord. We receive good from the Lord, ought we not also receive evil?" (Job 1:21, 2:10)
Perhaps a last thought on poverty, and the surrounding consequences (both positive and negative - simplicity and misery). Psychologically, there are the two extremes: becoming a victim, or becoming indignant. If we view poverty at a psychological level it comes across as essentially simple or essentially miserable. Poverty seems good under its guise of simplicity, so we are ready to abandon responsibilities to embrace the ideal of poverty. When that simplicity is challenged, only the attitude of true poverty: where all things and situations, simple and complicated, are dealt with first by entrusting them to God and second by a responsible engagement trusting in His help. Poverty seems evil under its guise of misery, so we tend to flee from misery, or eliminate poverty for fear of misery. When misery does enter our lives, we have to avoid the pitfalls of pitying ourselves as victims, or reacting with anger and indignation - misery can be healed by true poverty. God wants us to be poor, but does not will us to be miserable.
Mercy - both God's mercy, and the spiritual and corporal works of mercy all Christians are called to perform - is God's remedy to misery. The Latin word for mercy,
misericordia, implies this transference of another's misery (
miseri-) into one's own heart (
-cordia). To be merciful one must understand another's misery in one's own heart - in a similar way, compassion is suffering, or undergoing with another person. The one who receives mercy is freed from misery - the one who receives compassion is not alone in suffering. The experience of misery is the experience of a yoke, a kind of slavery - the greatest misery is sin, the sin of pride, and the greatest mercy is Christ's death on the cross which frees us from the slavery to sin. The experience of suffering progressively separates us from ourselves and others - the greatest suffering comes from sin, the wages of which are death, and death is the greatest separation we can know in ourselves (body from soul) and from others. The greatest compassion was Christ's death, that we might know in the presence of our own suffering, the presence of another who suffers with us so that we are never alone.
