Breaking the Word

Wednesday, September 12, 2007

Wednesday in the 23rd Week of Ordinary Time (I)
Blessed Poverty

Readings: Colossians 3:1-11; Psalms 145:2-3, 10-11, 12-13ab; Luke 6:20-26

Once again I find myself in a country where poverty is too real to ignore, where street children accost you on the streets as you emerge from a restaurant or bookstore. Just as real too is the high crime rate. Just yesterday, we were reminded not to resist if we were ever unfortunate enough to encounter a mugger. Of course, crime is not restricted to those who are poor, not by a long stretch. Today’s front page of the local newspaper carries the picture of a former president, already an ex-convict, who currently faces the specter of having to spend more time in prison. Still, one cannot deny the close relationship between poverty and crime.

How then to make sense of Jesus’ words in the gospel of today? Blessed are you who are poor… you who are now hungry… you who are now weeping… Can one really be considered blessed even when driven by poverty to commit armed robbery? What exactly is the poverty that is being commended? It's not an easy question to answer, not least because while the equivalent passage in Matthew’s gospel includes a qualification -- blessed are the poor in spirit… -- Luke’s version is more blunt. Yet, we may well wonder if it then follows that everyone who is materially poor is necessarily blessed.

The first reading comes to our aid. What is the kind of poverty – whether material or spiritual – that attracts God’s blessing? What are its characteristics and effects? From the letter to the Colossians, we might infer that blessed poverty helps to put to death the parts of us that are earthly: immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and the greed that is idolatry. Blessed poverty leads us – in our all our thoughts, words and actions – to seek what is above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God, even if we have to suffer as a result. Blessed poverty leads us to work towards true communion: Here there is not Greek and Jew, circumcision and uncircumcision, barbarian, Scythian, slave, free; but Christ is all and in all.

Is it easier to acquire this kind of blessed poverty if one were actually materially poor? Perhaps. Is it far more difficult if one were materially wealthy? Probably. Doesn’t Jesus say as much (see Luke 18:25)? Still, whatever our financial situation, each and all of us are called to the same blessed poverty, the kind that enables us continually to move away from the discord born of greed to the communion that comes from hearts centered on Christ.

How blessedly poor are we today?

2 comments:

AnonymousThu Sept 13, 04:31:00 am GMT+8
To be "poor in spirit" means to be less full of ourselves so that God has space in our lives.

This is tough as I spend my days on the go, and am always occupied with work/kids/family. We're also reminded to achieve, be confident and assertive and all this does not gel with being "poor in spirit".

I'm reminded of my dependence on God when I'm troubled. I seem to get no immediate answers to my worries and just have to trust in God that things will work out. I have to empty myself of the worries and the fear that if I did nothing, things would get worse.
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AnonymousThu Sept 13, 08:20:00 am GMT+8
When I was very young, my grandmother used to tell me that she didn't want to be materially poor - ever. I can understand what she meant, even as a child; not because she was in dire straits, but because she never had the luxuries that we take for granted today. She went on to add that if one were materially deprived, one can't help those who need our help. Wisdom 101.

Fast forward to modern day Singapore where wealth and plenty are self-evident. I myself am a beneficiary of the amazing economic progress that this country has achieved over the last 42 years - by the grace of God and human effort. Yet, for me there is constant tension between 'living the good life' and being attuned to the gentle prompting of the Spirit and following it. I say it is a 'tension' because the two are diametrically opposed. Didn't Jesus Himself say: "You cannot serve God and mammon (read money, sex, pleasure, fame, power, etc)".

Against this backdrop comes Fr Chris' helpful reflection: poverty (whatever type you may wish to associate it with) helps us detach ourselves from the things that draw us away from God. Can the materially poor realise this better than those materially well off? Perhaps, if their deprivation doesn't drive them to envy and greed. What about those materially blessed? Perhaps, if their state of comfort and self-sufficiency doesn't shut them off from God and neighbor.

In Fr Chris; own words: there is no easy answer (only God's grace).
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Breaking News: Ordinary Time

Apart from those seasons having their own distinctive character, thirty-three or thirty-four weeks remain in the yearly cycle that do not celebrate a specific aspect of the mystery of Christ. Rather, especially on the Sundays, they are devoted to the mystery of Christ in all its aspects. This period is known as Ordinary Time. Ordinary Time begins on Monday after the Sunday following 6 January and continues until Tuesday before Ash Wednesday inclusive. It begins again on Monday after Pentecost and ends before Evening Prayer I of the First Sunday of Advent. This is also the reason for the series of liturgical texts found in both the Roman Missal and The Liturgy of the Hours (Vol. III - IV), for Sundays and weekdays in this season. ~ General Norms for the Liturgical Year & Calendar, 43-44

From 36th Jesuit General Congregation

It is our union with one another in Christ that testifies to the Good News more powerfully than our competences and abilities.... In our individualistic and competitive age, we should remember that the community plays a very special role since it is a privileged place of apostolic discernment.... The Jesuit community is a concrete space in which we live as friends in the Lord. This life together is always at the service of mission, but because these fraternal bonds proclaim the Gospel, it is itself a mission. –Companions in a Mission of Reconciliation and Justice (CMRJ), nn. 7-9.

With the poor, we can learn what hope and courage mean.... In our communities and apostolates, we hear the call to rediscover hospitality to strangers, to the young, to the poor, and to those who are persecuted. Christ himself teaches us this hospitality. –CMRJ, nn. 15-16.

At the heart of Ignatian spirituality is the transforming encounter with the mercy of God in Christ that moves us to a generous personal response. The experience of the merciful gaze of God on our weakness and sinfulness humbles us and fills us with gratitude, helping us to become compassionate ministers to all.... For us Jesuits, compassion is action, an action discerned together. Yet we know that there is no authentic familiarity with God if we do not allow ourselves to be moved to compassion and action by an encounter with the Christ who is revealed in the suffering, vulnerable faces of people, indeed in the suffering of creation. –CMRJ, nn. 19-20.

(T)he Society must respond more decisively to the Church’s call for a new evangelization, giving special emphasis to ministry to and with the young and with families.... A special gift Jesuits and the Ignatian family have to offer to the Church and her mission of evangelization is Ignatian spirituality, which facilitates the experience of God and can therefore greatly help the process of personal and communal conversion. –CMRJ, nn. 22-23.

In many societies, there is an increased level of conflict and polarization, which often gives rise to violence that is all the more appalling because it is motivated and justified by distorted religious convictions. In such situations, Jesuits, along with all who seek the common good, are called to contribute from their religious-spiritual traditions towards the building of peace, on local and global levels. –CMRJ, n. 28.

Pope Francis has emphasized the fundamental connection between the environmental crisis and the social crisis in which we live today. Poverty, social exclusion, and marginalization are linked with environmental degradation. These are not separate crises but one crisis that is a symptom of something much deeper: the flawed way societies and economies are organised. The current economic system with its predatory orientation discards natural resources as well as people. For this reason, Pope Francis insists that the only adequate solution must be a radical one. The direction of development must be altered if it is to be sustainable. We Jesuits are called to help heal a broken world, promoting a new way of producing and consuming, which puts God’s creation at the center.... The multifaceted challenge of caring for our common home calls for a multifaceted response from the Society. We begin by changing our personal and community lifestyles, adopting behaviour coherent with our desire for reconciliation with creation. – CMRJ, nn. 29-30

From 35th Jesuit General Congregation

From General Congregation 35

By sending us to 'those physical and spiritual places which others do not or have difficulty reaching,' the Pope entrusts to us the task to 'build bridges of understanding and dialogue,' according to the best tradition of the Society, in the diversity of its ministries.
- Decree With Renewed Fervor and Dynamism, n. 6

To be missioned to this work 'at the New Frontiers of our times' always requires that one also be rooted at the very heart of the Church. This tension, specific to the Ignatian charism, opens the way to true creative fidelity.
- Decree With Renewed Fervor and Dynamism, n. 13

In every mission that we carry out, we seek only to be where (Christ) sends us. The grace we receive as Jesuits is to be and to go with him, looking on the world with his eyes, loving it with his heart and entering into its depths with his unending compassion.
- Decree on Identity, n. 15

For ultimately, there is no reality that is only profane for those who know how to look. We must communicate this look and provide a pedagogy inspired by the Spiritual Exercises, that carries people - especially the young - into it.
- Decree on Identity, n. 10

Our ministries of proclamation of the Word and the celebration of the Life of Christ in the sacraments continue to be fundamental for our mission and our lives together as Jesuits.
- Decree on Mission, n. 19

The complexity of the problems we face and the richness of the opportunities offered demand that we engage in building bridges between rich and poor and establishing advocacy links of mutual support between those who hold political power and those who find it difficult to voice their interests. Our intellectual apostolate provides an inestimable help in setting up these bridges, offering us new ways of understanding in depth the mechanism and links among our present problems.
- Decree on Mission, n. 28

Jesuit community is not just for mission, it is itself mission.
- Decree on Mission, n. 41

In this global context it is important to highlight the extraordinary potential represented by our character as an international and multicultural body. Acting consistently with this character can not only enhance the apostolic effectiveness of our work but in a fragmented and divided world it can witness to the reconciliation in solidarity of all the children of God.
- Decree on Mission, n. 43

Faith in Jesus Christ teaches us that self-realization comes from self-giving and that freedom is not so much the power to choose as the power to order our choices toward love. At the same time, love for Jesus Christ and the desire to follow him call us to trusting commitment. Commitment to the Word Incarnate cannot be separated from commitment to the concrete manifestations of the Word that are at the center of our lives, the Church and the Society which exists to serve the Church.
- Decree on Obedience, n. 19