It is truly an article of faith that poverty is central
to the theology of Christmas. The Catechism of the Catholic Church states it
thus: “Jesus shares the life of the poor,
from the cradle to the cross.” [Catechism of the Catholic Church 544.] Blessed
John Paul II reiterated this doctrine, preaching that “Christ who was rich became freely poor, was born in a lowly manger, preached
liberation to the poor, identified with the poor, made them his disciples and
promised them his kingdom.” Benedict XVI has pointed to the fact that Jesus
was born into a poor family surrounded by “the
poor, and anonymous shepherds ... The little ones, the poor in spirit: they are
the key figures of Christmas, in the past and in the present.” Pope Francis explains the implications from
this fact: “to be like Him we must not
put ourselves above others, but rather lower ourselves, putting ourselves at
the service, making ourselves little with the little and poor with the poor.”
Archbishop Óscar A. Romero of El Salvador was even more
succinct in his formulation: “the Christ of Bethlehem is the divine summation
of my entire Gospel preaching,” said Romero. [«Orientación» Weekly, December 25, 1977.] Explaining in more detail,
Romero states that, “based on Bethlehem
Christians can no longer invent another Christ or another liberating doctrine
apart from the authentic Gospel: the Gospel of poverty and austerity,
detachment and obedience to the will of the Father, of humility and of the path
to the beatitudes and to the cross.”
Id. From poverty and humility to the cross, there is only one
step, announced Ab. Romero: the rejection of a world not ready to accept the scandal
of a lowly, humble Lord and God. “Like Christ the Church grows during the
darkness of night. The Gospel of Saint John says: ‘He came into the world but
the world did not know him’,” preached Romero.
To avoid this ignorance, this lack of understanding,
Romero announced the “good news” in the most concrete and urgent language of
which he was capable and proclaimed, “Christ was not born twenty centuries ago;
Christ is born today in the midst of our people.” He says this to give
greater effect to his words not to “look
for God among the opulence of the world, or among the idolatries of wealth or
among those eager for power or among the intrigues of the powerful.” To do so would be wasted effort: “God is not there. Let us look for God with
the sign announced by the angels: resting in a manger and wrapped in swaddling
clothes made by the humble peasant woman of Nazareth—poor swaddling clothes and
a little hay on which this God-made-man rested, on which this King of the ages
becomes accessible to humankind as a poor child.” In today’s world, we should “look for him among the children
lacking proper nutrition who have gone to sleep this evening with nothing to
eat. Let us look for him among the poor newspaper boys who sleep in the
doorways wrapped in today’s paper. Let us look for him in the shoeshine boy who
perhaps has earned enough to buy a small gift for his mother. Let us look for
him in the newspaper boy who, because he did not sell enough papers, is
severely reprimanded by his stepfather or stepmother.”
In a famous and widely quoted phrase, Romero said that “no
one can celebrate an authentic Christmas unless they are truly poor.”
Applying the social doctrine to what the Catechism says, the Martyr Bishop
explained that, “The self-sufficient, the
proud of heart, those who despise others because they do not possess the
material goods of this earth, those who do not need or want God—for these
people there is no Christmas. Only the poor, the hungry, and those who need
someone to come to them because they have need of someone, someone who is God,
someone who is Emmanuel, God-with-us—only these people are able to celebrate
Christmas.” And in words astonishingly laden with common sense, he
explained, “people have no desire to eat
when they are not hungry. People also have no need for God when they are proud
and/or self-sufficient. Only the poor, only those who are hungry can be
satisfied.” And he gives us this
Christmas beatitude: “Blessed are those
who see the coming of Christmas in the same way that those who are hungry see
the gift of food. People cannot desire liberation or freedom unless they are
conscious of being enslaved.”
When Benedict XVI inaugurated a 2009 Christmas lunch
with the poor, recognizing this important note of the social doctrine at
Christmas, he said, “I have come to you
precisely on the Feast of the Holy Family because, in a certain way, you
resemble it.” The Pope Emeritus’ words remind us of what Archbishop Romero had said
thirty years earlier: “Tonight the people
of El Salvador are very much like Jesus in Bethlehem, for we are a poor people
and we present ourselves to God in the same way that Mary and Joseph and Jesus
presented their poverty to God.”
Archbishop Romero reminds us that the poor draw us closer to Christmas and to God.
Archbishop Romero reminds us that the poor draw us closer to Christmas and to God.
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