Can you receive from the poor?

Homily for 32nd Sunday in Ordinary Time
St. Lawrence Catholic Campus Center
8 November 2009
Year for Priests

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Before I went to seminary, I worked in development for the Church. In short, I was responsible for getting people with means to put large sums of money into the treasury of the Church. For the most part, my life was focused on the people that Jesus ignores in today's Gospel. I don't say this to suggest that what I did was unimportant. In order to build the kingdom of God, and to have buildings that enable the family of God to gather, and evangelization efforts that effectively proclaim the Gospel of life and love to the world, it takes money. It takes lots of it. And it takes the commitment of many people of means. Hence, development work in the Church. Getting to know people of means, sharing the vision of the Church with them, and gathering people of means for parties, and meetings. Finding ways to recognize and motivate them to make a gift that will make a huge difference in the ability of the Church to build the kingdom and proclaim the Gospel. I have to say that as much as I enjoyed this work, and as much as I enjoyed the people I met and the impact I was able to make, there was something missing. Even as important as the work of development is, a work that I am very willing to continue doing todayas a priest, the reality is that most of the gifts made to the Church, even the million dollar ones, represented less than 1% of the net worth of the individual involved. The rule of thumb is this, that the more a person has, the smaller percentage of his income he is willing to give away. Why is this? Today's Gospel tells us why. The more a person has, the more he is afraid he will run out. The less a person has, the less afraid he is of running out. This sounds counterintuitive, but it is true. The poor at least have the experience of running out time and time again, and yet finding a way to move forward despite their desperate plight. The rich lose their trust because this trust is never tested or purified.

I could turn this homily into a rant about how terrible it is that Catholics only give 1-2% of their income to the Church. I could tell you how much the Church needs more resources to do the work that Christ has entrusted to her. But I'm not going to. I do not want your money to keep you out of heaven, but realistically, the Church will continue well into the future even if no one gives a dime. There are ways to proclaim the Gospel without money. Today's reflection is about listening to how often Jesus himself talks to his disciples about money, and about listening to his admonition that where your money is, there also your heart will be.

There are exceptions to this rule of the rich giving less, of course. There are many fine people of means who have made extraordinarily sacrificial gifts to the Church. But most of these large gifts differ in substance from the gifts we have put before us today in the scriptures. Both Elijah and Jesus observe the giving of widows, the most impoverished members of their societies. These widows give not 1% of their income, but 100% of their income. Both gave their whole livelihood. What is more, both gave despite their having less than the people they were giving to. Elijah, with his status as a prophet, had access to greater security than did the widow from whom God commanded him to beg. The 2 cents put into the temple treasury by the widow observed by Jesus was no doubt statistically insignificant.

Have you ever received a gift from someone who was poorer than you? Of course you have. We all have. We have given these gifts too. As children, we probably made gifts for our parents, that were priceless because they came from someone who had so little. Gifts from poor to rich are particularly interesting and beautiful, because they go against the grain. Gifts naturally should flow more readily from rich to poor. At Christmas, the people with means are expected to make larger gifts than the people without means. It would be odd for a child to give a gift to his parents that costs more than the toys he received. Giving naturally goes from rich to poor. But today's Gospel says that these are not the most important gifts. The most significant gifts, according to the eyes of Jesus who points his disciples away from the rich people and toward the widow, are gifts that go from poor to rich. Think about that. The gifts that change us, and change the world the most, are gifts that go from poor to rich.

I invite you to think about your life and to reflect on whether or not this is true. I have been on the receiving end of thousands of gifts, but one that stands out the most is the gift I received from orphan girls in Honduras. I went to Santa Rosa de Copan in 2005 with members of my first parish to personalize our parish's gifts to the orphanage. My parish was helping the Franciscan sisters there with renovating and expanding the buildings of the orphanage, and providing them needed operational monies. As the first days of the visit went on, I could feel my heart expanding in ways I could not have predicted. I found myself getting happier and happier and happier. My happiness was more pure than the happiness I felt day to day at home. It actually bothered me a little bit, until I figured out why. It was simple. The gift from rich to poor, the gift that I represented, was important, but the gift from rich to poor did not produce happiness. What I was receiving from these little orphan girls, the gift from poor to rich, was producing happiness. These girls, whose only belongings fit into a tiny box by their bedside, who didn't even have the riches of a family who loved them, were giving me a thousand times more than I could give them. From the moment I arrived at the orphanage, everything that the girls had was mine. Their time, their energy, their love - everything was mine the moment I arrived there. I realized quickly the disparity between me and these girls. I, the rich man, had come to share some of my resources and some of my love; they, the poor girls, gave me instantly what I could not give them. They gave me their whole livelihood, and all of their love, without a thought to counting the cost. Tonight we are invited by the scriptures to remember that the gifts that have changed our hearts the most are not gifts from rich to poor, but gifts from poor to rich.

The lesson of today's Gospel is not that it is ok to be destitute, or that everyone should strive to be as destitute as the heroes of today's scriptures, the two widows. Even those who take vows of poverty in our Catholic tradition can and do have more security than these two widows. There is no excuse in our world, given the vast intellectual resources spent on so many other things, for us to lack the knowledge or will to eliminate poverty. It is a disgrace for anyone to be in danger of death because they lack basic nutrition or shelter. Woe to anyone whose conscience has become numb to the cries of the poor. There will always be a need for heroic work in evangelizing the rich so that true charity may be the hallmark of their lives, and that the world's wealth will be used not to oppress mankind, but to serve the common dignity of all people.

Still, even if the goal is not for us to become destitute, the lesson of today's Gospel holds. Blessed are the poor, for theirs in the kingdom of heaven. Those with little in the way of material wealth worry less about the future than those with much. What is more, those who horde have the greatest likelihood of running out, whereas those that give everything they have enjoy the greatest security. As pertains to the Gospel, gifts from rich to poor help a little, but gifts from poor to rich plant the seeds of the kingdom of God more than any other gifts. May this be true especially of those supernatural gifts we receive from God, those virtues on which the final destiny and dignity of man rest. If we are low of faith, let us share what faith we have with others, so that we may never run out. If we are low on hope, let us share what little hope we have with others, so that we may never run out. If we are low on love, let us share what little love we have with others, without counting the cost, so that we may never run out. +m