It came
as somewhat of a shock to realize I have not worked on this commentary since
the feast of St. Joseph, spending so much time focused on the Covid 19 Hope
essays! However, that is actually part of living out selling all you possess
and to: Give it directly, personally to the poor. [1]
While
time is a gift given to us, and not per se something we possess, by and large
we do control how we use the time gifted to us.
Helping
one another in these dark days is both true charity and dispossession, the giving
directly to the poor and everyone, in various ways, not all of them economic,
is vitally important.
Some
people, mostly unknown to us, do choose to sell or give away everything they
possess and embrace a life of total poverty such as the ancient mendicants, and
modern mendicants, continue to do so. Not only within Christianity but in other
religions as well.
While
St. Francis and his companions started out that way the expansion of their
vocation from itinerant preachers to pastors of parishes, and other works,
means more communal living and possessing what is necessary for their
apostolate. St. Mother Teresa’s Sisters, Brothers and Priests live a stricter
poverty, as do the men, women, and priests of Madonna House. Again, it is a
matter of the particular vocation and apostolate.
Each of
us who live other vocations, such as in Holy Marriage, as parents with
children, consecrated men and women virgins living in the world, hermits, etc.,
need also to stand humbly before the Holy Spirit asking Him, as He will, to
enlighten us how to be dispossessed, to give what we do possess directly,
personally to the poor. Here too the guidance of a priest-spiritual
director will help ensure that, for example as parents, we do not deprive the
family of what is necessary.
Satan,
if he cannot seduce us with obvious evil will use another pernicious tactic,
that of seducing us with what appears to be a good, extreme dispossession:
selling/giving away so much that we impoverish our family or are no longer able
to properly care for our own lives.
The key
is to understand the difference between need and want. I need good food to eat.
I may want the best filet mignon several times a week, rather than say fish or
less expensive cuts of meat. By ‘selling’ my want and embracing the selflessness
of need, the difference in money saved becomes a gift I can give directly to
the poor such as by keeping a few dollars in my pocket so I don’t pass by my
homeless brother or sister begging for help but can give them, thus giving to
Christ Himself, what I have.
Material
dispossession and material generosity are comparatively easy next to
cooperating with the Most Holy Spirit to be dispossessed of the false self, the
self that strives to always be the center of attention, have the last word,
have one’s opinions dominate conversations, the false self which seeks the
first place in every aspect of life, is more interested in being loved and
accepted than loving and accepting etc., and etc.! Then Jesus said to His
disciples, “Whoever wishes to come after Me must deny himself, take up his
cross, and follow Me.” [Mt.16:24ff] “…..everyone of you who does not renounce
all his possessions cannot be My disciple.” [Lk. 14:33]
To deny
the self is to deny the false self, the egocentric self, the self who, if we be
brutally honest, often acts, thinks, as if smarter than God. It is these
possessions we truly need to be unburdened of, for they are the chains that
bind us, weigh us down, keep a wall we build brick by brick between ourselves
and God who is love. It is to sink more and more into the quagmire of a
aloneness which destroys marriages, alienates parents from children,
citizens/neighbours from one another and on the grand scale breeds hatreds,
discriminations, conflicts/wars between nations. Only when we dwell within
union with His Most Sacred Heart will we become poor as He became poor for us
and then be able to see self and other as He sees us and love one another
accordingly: “Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am meek and
humble of heart; and you will find rest for yourselves. For My yoke is easy,
and My burden light.” [Mt.11:29] “I give you a new commandment: love one
another. As I have loved you, so you also should love one another. This is how
all will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.”
[Jn.13:34] “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your
soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength…..You shall love your
neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.” [Mk.12:30,31]
“What
then is it that we have to bring to the poor? First, it seems to me, the
realization that we are the poorest of the poor. Secondly, a realization
that unless we truly love ourselves, we cannot even begin to love our
neighbours…..Among the ways of loving ourselves is this acceptance of our
poverty which acknowledges that we are totally dependent on God, and which
acts, therefore, always according to His will. But to act according to God’s
will, one must empty oneself of all self-centredness, selfishness, egotism.
Positively, one must have a listening heart that is free, poor, one that
listens to the quiet voice of God and follows it.” [2]
[1] https://www.madonnahouse.org/mandate/
[2] The
Gospel Without Compromise, pp.101 & 106; Catherine de Hueck Doherty, 1989,
Madonna House Publications.
© 2020
Fr. Arthur Joseph
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