“It was only when the economy began to open up that all these things started happening… people started to get greedy, because there were things for them to get, now—”
Somehow in the course of our lunch conversation, we began all listening to my Vietnamese colleague, who had grown up while Vietnam’s economic policy was still very Communistic, and when the Soviet Union was still going strong. “People used to be better to each other, because they were poor together. They got the same amount of money and it was very little. So you help each other out and suffer together. Then… once there was money to fight over, they started fighting.”
It was an amusing topic for us to discuss at lunch, because to some extent, of course, our livelihoods depend on a capitalistic economy. I couldn’t help thinking, though, about what he had said. There seemed almost a romanticisation of poverty in what he was saying—or at least the potential for that—which is something many are naturally wary about. After all, if we romanticise poverty, doesn’t that excuse us from using our relative abundance to help those with less? Doesn’t that line of reasoning legitimise a kind of paternalistic not-helping, if the rich man had said to Lazarus, “being poor is good for you, so just keep being poor!” and resumed his banquet. And along the same line of reasoning, what about “Blessed are the poor”? Now there’s divine sanction for leaving materially poor people to be poor because it’s apparently better for them…
All these are, to some extent, true. In fact, in the examples of the saints and in the very character of religious life, we see hints of something even more radical in how the Church has interpreted this beatitude. It is more than “Blessed are the people who are poor right now”—it’s “blessed are the people who will leave house, home, and inheritance to become poor.” Some among us are called to seek to be poor.
But for what? For poverty’s own sake—that is, for the sake of being in a state of need? What kind of ingratitude is that, to throw away all kinds of riches that poor people would want, and to go and join them in the experience of poverty? No, poverty itself that is a physical state to be sought out. For Christ’s own words command us to aid the poor and those in need, and advise us that whenever we do such a thing, we are helping His own self:
For I was hungry, and you gave me to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave me to drink; I was a stranger, and you took me in: Naked, and you covered me: sick, and you visited me: I was in prison, and you came to me. Then shall the just answer him, saying: Lord, when did we see thee hungry, and fed thee; thirsty, and gave thee drink? And when did we see thee a stranger, and took thee in? or naked, and covered thee? Or when did we see thee sick or in prison, and came to thee? And the king answering, shall say to them: Amen I say to you, as long as you did it to one of these my least brethren, you did it to me. (Matthew 25:35-40)
The state of need, we can see, is not one that we should leave people in. But then what is poverty good for? To answer this, let us return to my colleague’s story.
He tells a materialist’s story: when there was no money, people were better; when there was more money, people started getting nasty. (Caveat: correlation is not causation, and I’m sure he knows that; but let’s just do this cool rhetorical thing that lets me recapitulate the beginning.) But really, his is a story of the human condition, and the human inclination to grasping for power and control. We want to win, and to get more than we already have; wasn’t that behind the first Fall, the promise of more? Even though our first parents could eat and drink their fill and enjoy the presence of God, it was suggested to them that they could have more—and the rest is history, and the rest is history repeating itself as we keep making the same mistake.
When we don’t think that we want more—whether it’s because we’re fairly certain that we can’t get more, or simply because we are grateful for all we have and happily accepting anything God will give us and detached from whatever we do own—then, undistracted by the promise of wealth and gain and power, we can pay attention to the things that matter: God, virtue, … and become immeasurably rich in the contemplation of the things of God, and in the love of man. In that vein, it’s possible to be materially poor but spiritually rich.
The problem most of us have, and which my colleague’s anecdote made mention of, is that it’s far too easy to become spiritually impoverished and materially rich. I feel it too, whenever I have a small windfall or a new cherished trinket, and react with instinctual horror at the thought of its dissipation or loss. But that’s what honesty (to not take what is not yours) and alms-giving (to give away what is yours) are important, although sometimes they feel like you’re getting your teeth pulled out.
the lexical form 