Saturday of this weekend is the feast day of St Vincent DePaul. He was a priest who was born in France more than 400 years ago. To this day, he is remembered for his compassion, humility, and generosity, so much so that many Catholic parishes throughout the world have Societies of St Vincent DePaul that serve the poor and needy. St. Vincent DePaul taught that true charity does not consist only of distributing alms and giving out financial assistance, but also in helping the poor feel the fullness of their human dignity and freedom. He taught that our good works must never be separated from our faith, but rather must flow out of our faith. Thus, St Vincent DePaul counseled, that to be men and women of action and good works, we must also be men and women of prayer and deep spirituality. He advises us: “You must have an inner life, everything must tend in that direction. If you lack this, you lack everything.” St Vincent DePaul touched people’s lives by his witness of faith.The way he empowered the laity, and his work with abandoned children, prisoners, victims of catastrophe and natural disaster, refugees, and the homebound were groundbreaking in his day. St Vincent DePaul has had a profound affect on how many charitable organizations and governmental agencies approach such issues today.
I was reminded of St Vincent DePaul when I read today’s Gospel. Lazarus might be the type of person who would have gone to St Vincent DePaul for help. In the Gospel, Lazarus was alone on the streets: hungry, homeless and sick. There's a lot we don't know about Lazarus. Was he struggle with alcoholism, drug addiction, or mental health issues? Was he injured or too sick to work? Was he down on his luck or had he been recently laid off from his job? Had he recently been released from prison? Or was he having a difficult time getting his life together after a recent crisis?
We don't know those facts about Lazarus. Ultimately, these details don’t matter to the moral of the story. But, there are certain facts that we do know. Lazarus was a poor man who lived outside the gate of a rich man who had wealth in abundance. The rich man dined as if every day were a sumptuous banquet; he wore clothing colored with a very expensive purple dye; he lived in a grand estate enclosed by a gate that was meant to keep people like Lazarus out. Lazarus was always at that gate, part of the rich man's daily scenery. Even though Lazarus was always present, he was invisible to the rich man who had more important and pressing matters on his agenda.
By their very nature, Jesus' parables can take shocking twists and turns. These parables are designed to wake us up and to pull us out of our complacency, to show us how God's kingdom is different from the ways of the world. In eternal life, the rich man is in agony and torment; he is the one in need. He wants Lazarus to bring him a cool drink to refresh him. It never crosses his mind the times that he could have brought refreshment to Lazarus when both of them walked the earth. He could have thrown Lazarus scraps from his meals, but he never did. Maybe the rich man went to the synagogue each day, maybe he tried to be an observant Jew, but if he did not have charity and mercy in his heart and in the way he lived out his life, what did his faith really mean to him?
According to Pope Francis, the story of Lazarus teaches us that other people are a gift. Right relationships with our brothers and sisters consist of gratefully recognizing their value. The poor man at our door is not a nuisance; rather, he is a summons to conversion and change. Lazarus invites us to open the doors of our hearts to others, to see them as a gift, whether they be our neighbor next door or the poor person we meet on the streets.
In a few short days, we begin the month of October, which is Respect Life Month in our Catholic faith. The 2025 theme Respect Life Month is "Life: Our Sign of Hope". This theme ties into the ongoing Jubilee Year of Hope and emphasizes that the dignity of every person is to serve as a beacon of hope for a better world. The way we treat the most at risk and the most vulnerable in society, people like Lazarus, is a testament to how we respect human life. As the story of Lazarus calls us to reach out to the poor and the vulnerable, may our words and actions respect the dignity of all human life and God’s creation.
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