Blessed are the poor in spirit,
for theirs shall be the kingdom of heaven.(Matt. 5.3)
I wanted to write a post for today, but wasn't sure what to say.
I thought about the topic of 'what makes a Christian' but then my mind turned to the Beatitudes.
I started reading them and was immediately struck by the very first one. Blessed are the poor in spirit... What did it mean?
According to Catholic Answers, there are several answers. Once agains, it was the first that struck me. It begins:
Someone poor in spirit is someone who lives in his spiritual life the way a man who is poor in body lives in his physical life. The physically poor man works each day to receive his bread. The spiritual poor man prays each day to receive spiritual nourishment from the Lord: “Give us this day our daily bread.”
The part that really spoke to me, however, was this:
The physically poor man does not have time for unnecessary distractions. The spiritually poor man sees that he must always attend to the necessities of the spiritual life: prayer, works of mercy, confession of sins, and he does not give in to unnecessary distractions.
- prayer
- works of mercy
- confession of sins
- no unnecessary distractions
Why did these spiritual necessities speak to me? I guess because they are a roadmap, a roadmap to holiness. Now, to be sure, none of this is new to me - I am not that spiritually simple. However, there is nothing like seeing things written down in clear-as-day fashion for their relevance to be made clear. And so, I now have an unexpected opportunity to ask myself about how my prayer life is going, what works of mercy do I do, when should I next go to confession, and what distracts me (because, boy do I already know that certain things do! Cough cough social media). What a blessing!
image: aaronianthuisba | pinterest
Advent - 2
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