For two-thirds of the world, poverty is the order of the day.

 Yet, as Epicurus knew, “Wealth consists not in having great possessions, but in having few wants’ It  is that kind of poverty of which Jesus speaks when he tells the rich young man to “sell everything you have, give to the poor, and come follow me.”

The alleluia that arises out of poverty is not about having nothing; the alleluia is in gratitude for the kind of poverty that want for nothing that does not add to a sense of the presence of God and the liberating grace of enoughness. May we all be so lucky as to have that much. For that we must all shape our hearts in different, more life-giving ways.

For that, we must all learn to cultivate in ourselves the poverty we do not know and grieve the riches that protect us from finding it.