Friday of the Twenty-fourth Week in Ordinary Time

Today's Mass Readings

I continue to focus on the meaning of the Cross and reconciliation. It’s important to focus on another simple yet necessary theme in Christianity. Poverty, or being poor in spirit. “Blessed are the poor in spirit; the Kingdom of Heaven is theirs.” This theme always runs against the grain. There never has been a society that values poverty as an ideal. Christianity, however, sees redemptive value in spiritual poverty.

St. Augustine wrote that God loves the poor. This isn’t to say that we want to keep people in poverty. Rather classical Christian spirituality places value on being detached from material possessions. Many saints valued strict poverty, from St. Francis of Assisi to St. Ignatius of Loyola. Then there were saints who lived modestly but not in luxury. St. John Paul II is such an example. Again, this isn’t to say that everyone should be poor as poor can be. It does mean that we are to live and give generously, being detached from material things. St. Paul wrote in Philippians chapter 4 that he learned to live with abundance and with nothing since he “could do all things through Christ” who strengthened him. The end of today’s Gospel reading summarizes this well. The other people who followed Jesus provided for Him and the Twelve “out of their resources.”

Give what you can with an open heart, and God will provide the rest.

Reflection by Br. Matthew Marie, OSB