Another of Jesus' non-negotiables is justice and generosity toward the poor and the outsider. That's quite clear, quite absolute - page after page of the Gospels. And now Christians think nothing of amassing fortunes and living grandly. Jesus' bias toward the poor was something that rich nations did not want to hear.
Richard Rohr, from the CAC webcast, Nov. 8, 2008: "What is The Emerging Church?"
Rohr is right when he says we don't wish to hear this - and I fear that we may fail to take the opportunity offered us by the current economic troubles. It seems that much of the work of the popular arts (music, cinema) of the Great Depression was devoted to getting rich, rising above the grey dole queues to a glittering invulnerable world perfectly shown by Busby Berkeley.
But poverty without joy is depression itself. It's only when we live out joy within poverty that we can live as Christ called us to live; and it's only the Spirit living within us who can fill us with that joy (Luke 10.21) It's that teaching which Francis brought so clearly to the world of his day, and it's that teaching of which Franciscans must keep reminding the world in which we find ourselves living, today maybe more than ever...
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