The
poor shall always be with you - that is what Jesus says in today’s Gospel. It is
not that he did not have compassion for the poor, for he spent a lot of his
ministry hanging out with the poor and the outcasts, standing in solidarity
with the least of society, curing their infirmities and multiplying food for
them to eat. Jesus
probably would have praised Mary had she decided herself to spend the money to
help them poor. He probably would have seen that as admirable and
compassionate. However, out of his compassion, he praises Mary for her actions for honoring
Jesus and ministering to him with the costly oil in this act of love. When
I was on the Camino one daily, I walked several miles with a young woman from
Lithuania. When I told her I was a
priest and told her about my work in Mississippi and my love for the Camino,
she told me she perceived many of the priests in her country as men who desired
a comfortable lifestyle, power, position, and honor. That is quite different from what called me to the priesthood and from how I see the priests in our Diocese of Jackson living out their priesthood in their daily lives. That
is also quite different from the view of the priesthood that Pope Francis has called
his priests to, to a servant priesthood in the spirit of Gospel simplicity. Pope
Francis wants us to be a Church that is poor, a Church that is of the poor and for the poor. Pope Francis has even called out priest who drive
fancy cars and who live in big mansions.
I
think all of us need to look at the way we use our resources and the gifts and
treasures that we have. We can use them
selfishly, or we can use them in service to God and in service to others. We priests sometimes hear such things in the
confessional – the faithful confessing that they have not been good stewards of
their treasures, that they need to look at the way they reach out to others and
perform works of charity. Let
us think about that as we journey during Holy Week with Jesus toward the Easter
mysteries.
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