POVERTY - TWO CLASSES

POVERTY - TWO CLASSES

As our graphic reveals - mankind today attempts to erase it. And Jesus had a much different view of poverty.

Jesus is the Poor Man, infinitely and rigorously poor. Poor with an absolute poverty! The Prince of poverty! The Lord of perfect destitution! The Poor Man Who lives with the poor, Who has come for the poor, Who speaks to the poor, Who gives to the poor, Who works for the poor! Poor among the poor, Destitute among the destitute, Beggar among the beggars! The Poor Man of a great and eternal poverty! The Happy and Rich Poor Man, Who accepts poverty, Who desires poverty, Who weds himself to poverty, Who sings of poverty! The Beggar Who gives gifts! The Naked Man Who covers the naked! The Hungry Man Who feeds others, the Miraculous and Supernat­ural, Who changes the men owning false riches into poor men, and poor men into those with real wealth.

There are poor men who are poor because they were never capable of acquiring wealth. There are other poor men who are poor because they give away every evening what they earned that day; and the more they give the more they have, as Jesus taught. Their wealth, the wealth of this second class of poor men, grows greater in proportion as it is given away. It is a pile which becomes greater as more is taken away from it.

Jesus was one of these poor men. Compared to one of them, men materially rich, rich as the world esteems wealth, rich with their chests of talents, mina, rupees, florins, shekels, crowns, francs, marks, and dollars, are only lamentable beg­gars. The money-changers of the forum, the great feasters of Jerusalem, the bankers of Florence and Frankfort, the lords of London, the multi-millionaires of New York, compared to these poor men are only unfortunate beggars, corrupted and needy; unpaid servants of a fierce master; condemned every day to assassinate their own souls. The wretchedness of such poverty is so terrible that they are reduced to pick up the stones that are found in the mud of the earth, and grope about in filth. Theirs is a poverty so repugnant that not even the poor succeed in bestowing on them the charity of a smile.