ORDO WEEK 27 THURSDAY MORNING PRAISE
Apostolic Exhortation: Dilexi Te Pope Leo
1. “I HAVE LOVED YOU” (Rev 3:9). The Lord speaks these words to a Christian community that, unlike some others, had no influence or resources, and was treated instead with violence and contempt:
2. This declaration of love, taken from the Book of Revelation, reflects the inexhaustible mystery that Pope Francis reflected upon in the Encyclical Dilexit Nos on the human and divine love of the heart of Jesus Christ
3. For this reason, in continuity with the Encyclical Dilexit Nos, Pope Francis was preparing in the last months of his life an Apostolic Exhortation on the Church’s care for the poor, to which he gave the title Dilexi Te, as if Christ speaks those words to each of them, saying: “You have but little power,” yet “I have loved you” ( Rev 3:9). I am happy to make this document my own — adding some reflections —
CHAPTER ONE
A FEW ESSENTIAL WORDS
4. Jesus’ disciples criticized the woman who poured costly perfumed oil on his head. They said: “Why this waste? (Mt 26:8-9,11). That woman saw in Jesus the lowly and suffering Messiah on whom she could pour out all her love. It was a small gesture, of course, but those who suffer know how great even a small gesture of affection can be, and how much relief it can bring.
5. Love for the Lord, then, is one with love for the poor. The same Jesus who tells us, “The poor you will always have with you” (Mt 26:11), also promises the disciples: “I am with you always” (Mt 28:20). This is not a matter of mere human kindness but a revelation: contact with those who are lowly and powerless is a fundamental way of encountering the Lord of history. In the poor, he continues to speak to us.
Saint Francis
6. Pope Francis, explaining his choice of that name, related how, after his election, a Cardinal friend of his embraced him, kissed him and told him: “Do not forget the poor!” [4] It is the same appeal that the leaders of the Church made to Saint Paul when he went up to Jerusalem to confirm his mission (cf. Gal 2:1-10).
7. Eight centuries ago, Saint Francis prompted an evangelical renewal in the Christians and society of his time. Wealthy and self-confident, the young Francis was taken aback and converted by his direct contact with the poor and outcast of society. I am convinced that the preferential choice for the poor is a source of extraordinary renewal both for the Church and for society, if we can only set ourselves free of our self-centeredness and open our ears to their cry.
The cry of the poor
8. The passage of Sacred Scripture in which God reveals himself to Moses in the burning bush can serve as a constant starting-point for this effort. There he says: “I have observed the misery of my people who are in Egypt; I have heard their cry on account of their taskmasters. Indeed, I know their sufferings, and I have come down to deliver them... So come, I will send you” ( Ex 3:7-8,10).
9. The condition of the poor is a cry that, throughout human history, constantly challenges our lives, societies, political and economic systems, and, not least, the Church. On the wounded faces of the poor, we see the suffering of the innocent and, therefore, the suffering of Christ himself. At the same time, we should perhaps speak more correctly of the many faces of the poor and of poverty, since it is a multifaceted phenomenon
10. In this sense, it can be said that the commitment to the poor and to removing the social and structural causes of poverty has gained importance in recent decades, but it remains insufficient. This is also the case because our societies often favor criteria for orienting life and politics that are marked by numerous inequalities.
11. A concrete commitment to the poor must also be accompanied by a change in mentality that can have an impact at the cultural level. In fact, the illusion of happiness derived from a comfortable life pushes many people towards a vision of life centered on the accumulation of wealth and social success at all costs, even at the expense of others and by taking advantage of unjust social ideals and political-economic systems that favor the strongest.
12 In general, we are witnessing an increase in different kinds of poverty, which is no longer a single, uniform reality but now involves multiple forms of economic and social impoverishment, reflecting the spread of inequality even in largely affluent contexts. Let us not forget that “doubly poor are those women who endure situations of exclusion, mistreatment and violence, since they are frequently less able to defend their rights. While significant changes are under way in some countries, “the organization of societies worldwide is still far from reflecting clearly that women possess the same dignity and identical rights as men. We say one thing with our words, but our decisions and reality tell another story,” [9] especially if we consider the numbers of women who are in fact destitute.
13. Looking beyond the data — which is sometimes “interpreted” to convince us that the situation of the poor is not so serious — the overall reality is quite evident: “Some economic rules have proved effective for growth, but not for integral human development. Wealth has increased, but together with inequality, with the result that ‘new forms of poverty are emerging.’ The claim that the modern world has reduced poverty is made by measuring poverty with criteria from the past that do not correspond to present-day realities. In other times, for example, lack of access to electric energy was not considered a sign of poverty, nor was it a source of hardship.
14. The poor are not there by chance or by blind and cruel fate. Nor, for most of them, is poverty a choice. Yet, there are those who still presume to make this claim, thus revealing their own blindness and cruelty. Nor can it be said that most of the poor are such because they do not “deserve” otherwise, as maintained by that specious view of meritocracy that sees only the successful as “deserving.”
15. Christians too, on a number of occasions, have succumbed to attitudes shaped by secular ideologies or political and economic approaches that lead to gross generalizations and mistaken conclusions. The fact that some dismiss or ridicule charitable works, as if they were an obsession on the part of a few and not the burning heart of the Church’s mission, convinces me of the need to go back and re-read the Gospel, lest we risk replacing it with the wisdom of this world. The poor cannot be neglected if we are to remain within the great current of the Church’s life that has its source in the Gospel and bears fruit in every time and place.
CHAPTER TWO
GOD CHOOSES THE POOR
The choice of the poor
16. God is merciful love, and his plan of love, which unfolds and is fulfilled in history, is above all his descent and coming among us to free us from slavery, fear, sin and the power of death. We came to know him in the smallness of a child laid in a manger and in the extreme humiliation of the cross, where he shared our radical poverty, which is death.
It is easy to understand, then, why we can also speak theologically of a preferential option on the part of God for the poor, an expression that arose in the context of the Latin American continent and in particular in the Puebla Assembly, but which has been well integrated into subsequent teachings of the Church. [12] This “preference” never indicates exclusivity or discrimination towards other groups, which would be impossible for God. . Wanting to inaugurate a kingdom of justice, fraternity and solidarity, God has a special place in his heart for those who are discriminated against and oppressed, and he asks us, his Church, to make a decisive and radical choice in favor of the weakest.
17. It is in this perspective that we can understand the numerous pages of the Old Testament in which God is presented as the friend and liberator of the poor, the one who hears the cry of the poor and intervenes to free them (cf. Ps 34:7). God, the refuge of the poor, denounces through the prophets — we recall in particular Amos and Isaiah — the injustices committed against the weakest, and exhorts Israel to renew its worship from within, because one cannot pray and offer sacrifice while oppressing the weakest and poorest.
Jesus, the poor Messiah
18. The Old Testament history of God’s preferential love for the poor and his readiness to hear their cry — to which I have briefly alluded — comes to fulfillment in Jesus of Nazareth. [14] By his Incarnation, he “emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness” ( Phil 2:7), and in that form he brought us salvation.
19. The Gospel shows us that poverty marked every aspect of Jesus’ life. From the moment he entered the world, Jesus knew the bitter experience of rejection. Indeed, that is how Jesus’ poverty is best described: he experienced the same exclusion that is the lot of the poor, the outcast of society. Jesus is a manifestation of this privilegium pauperum. He presented himself to the world not only as a poor Messiah, but also as the Messiah of and for the poor.
20. There are some clues about Jesus’ social status. First of all, he worked as a craftsman or carpenter, téktōn (cf. Mk 6:3). These were people who earned their living by manual labor. Not owning land, they were considered inferior to farmers. When the baby Jesus was presented in the Temple by Joseph and Mary, his parents offered a pair of turtledoves or pigeons (cf. Lk 2:22-24), which according to the prescriptions of the Book of Leviticus (cf. 12:8) was the offering of the poor. A fairly significant episode in the Gospel tells us how Jesus, together with his disciples, gathered heads of grain to eat as they passed through the fields (cf. Mk 2:23-28). Only the poor were allowed to do this gleaning in the fields. Moreover, Jesus says of himself: “Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests; but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head” (Mt 8:20; Lk 9:58). He is, in fact, an itinerant teacher, whose poverty and precariousness are signs of his bond with the Father. They are also conditions for those who wish to follow him on the path of discipleship. In this way, the renunciation of goods, riches and worldly securities becomes a visible sign of entrusting oneself to God and his providence.
21. At the beginning of his public ministry, Jesus appeared in the synagogue of Nazareth reading the scroll of the prophet Isaiah and applying the prophet’s words to himself: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor” (Lk 4:18; cf. Is 61:1). He thus reveals himself as the One who, in the here and now of history, comes to bring about God’s loving closeness, which is above all a work of liberation for those who are prisoners of evil, and for the weak and the poor. The signs that accompany Jesus’ preaching are manifestations of the love and compassion with which God looks upon the sick, the poor and sinners who, because of their condition, were marginalized by society and even people of faith. He opens the eyes of the blind, heals lepers, raises the dead and proclaims the good news to the poor: God is near, God loves you (cf. Lk 7:22). This explains why he proclaims: “Blessed are you poor, for yours is the kingdom of God” (Lk 6:20). God shows a preference for the poor: the Lord’s words of hope and liberation are addressed first of all to them. Therefore, even in their poverty or weakness, no one should feel abandoned. And the Church, if she wants to be Christ’s Church, must be a Church of the Beatitudes, one that makes room for the little ones and walks poor with the poor, a place where the poor have a privileged place (cf. Jas 2:2-4).
22. In that time, the needy and the sick, lacking the necessities of life, frequently found themselves forced to beg. They thus bore the added burden of social shame, due to the belief that sickness and poverty were somehow linked to personal sin.
23. I often wonder, even though the teaching of Sacred Scripture is so clear about the poor, why many people continue to think that they can safely disregard the poor.