{"id":1028,"date":"2015-09-27T05:00:11","date_gmt":"2015-09-27T05:00:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sjcmetheology.wpengine.com\/?p=1028"},"modified":"2015-09-27T05:00:11","modified_gmt":"2015-09-27T05:00:11","slug":"goal-path-simultaneously","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.sjcme.edu\/theology\/goal-path-simultaneously\/","title":{"rendered":"Goal & Path Simultaneously"},"content":{"rendered":"

Today is the feast of St. Vincent de Paul<\/a> (1581-1660). Another post-Reformation era exemplar of holiness, St. Vincent most memorably served the poor.\u00a0 His Congregation of \"St<\/a>the Mission, the Vincentians (or \u201cLazarists\u201d, named after their founding at the St. Lazarus prior in 1633), and a women\u2019s order he co-founded with St. Louise de Marillac, the Daughters of Charity, sought to serve the poor\u2019s spiritual and physical needs.\u00a0 Interestingly, together these two orders covered the needs of the French poor in both city and countryside.\u00a0 They did so based on St. Vincent\u2019s personal example.\u00a0 Throughout his life, whether he tutored a wealthy family\u2019s children, advised seminary training, or directed spiritual retreats, St. Vincent treated all equally.\u00a0 Having been sold into slavery for two years during his twenties, St. Vincent\u2019s missionary zeal knew few boundaries.\u00a0 He addressed the spiritual needs of those whom he encountered, wherever he met them.\u00a0 One online biographer concludes<\/a>: \u201cIt would be impossible to enumerate all the works of this servant of God. Charity was his predominant virtue. It extended to all classes of persons, from forsaken childhood to old age.\u201d The parish society bearing his name, the St. Vincent de Paul Society, which has accomplished so much for America\u2019s poor (as well as in other nations!), was founded in Paris in 1833 by Blessed Frederic Ozanam<\/a>.\u00a0 This group, too, takes its inspiration from St. Vincent\u2019s charity.<\/p>\n

Charity should be everybody\u2019s<\/u> predominant virtue, and not just because St. Vincent de Paul embodied it so well.\u00a0 The Catechism teaches that charity is \u201cthe theological virtue by which we love God above all things for His own sake, and our neighbor as ourselves for the love of God\u201d (#1822).\u00a0 Christ enjoined us to \u201clove as He does, even our enemies<\/em>,to make ourselves the neighbor of those farthest away, and to love children and the poor as Christ himself\u201d (#1825).\u00a0 Clearly St. Vincent de Paul sought this last command throughout his life.\u00a0 Charity is, the Catechism continues, \u201cthe form of the virtues<\/em>\u2026it is the source and goal of their Christian practice\u201d (#1827).\u00a0 Elsewhere the Catechism proclaims: \u201cCharity is the greatest social commandment. It respects others and their rights.\u00a0 It requires the practice of justice, and it alone makes us capable of it.\u00a0 Charity inspires a life of self-giving\u201d (#1889).\u00a0 So much for thinking of charity merely as dropping a few coins in the Salvation Army Christmas bucket!\u00a0 Charity is a virtue before it is an action, but the two are obviously related.<\/p>\n

How fitting, therefore, that today concludes Pope Francis\u2019 visit to Cuba and the United States<\/a>.\u00a0 In the days leading up to this momentous occasion, more than one media or \"Pope<\/a>political figure took issue with Pope Francis\u2019 stark call to serve people, and most immediately the poor, not ideologies.\u00a0 This is what one blogger has aptly called \u201cPope Francis Derangement Syndrome<\/a>,\u201d the inability of some\u2014Catholic or not\u2014to accept Francis\u2019 criticism of capitalist economies.\u00a0 Despite evidence that many of Francis\u2019 remarks follow similar ones made by Pope Benedict XVI, these critics reserve for themselves alone the right to select Pope Francis\u2019 legitimate message.\u00a0 In other words, they are not charitable, nor, apparently do they much appreciate charity.<\/p>\n

Bearing all that in mind, today\u2019s readings<\/a> might come into better focus.\u00a0 As Christ reminded the disciples in St. Mark\u2019s gospel, the one who is not against us is for us.\u00a0 Pope Francis, who took his name after another saint who joyfully served the poor, is surely \u201cfor us\u201d\u2026us all, actually.\u00a0 He extols charity to both poor and rich.\u00a0 The latter, though, require the charity of being reminded that their material possessions are not, ultimately, their own.\u00a0 That resonates with St. James\u2019 stark cry against the abuses committed by the wealthy.\u00a0 The Catechism does insist that charity requires, among other things, fraternal correction (#1829).\u00a0 So charity might help us hear more clearly the Holy Father\u2019s message.\u00a0 Meanwhile, charity will also move us to make our love of neighbor and the poor and our enemies all the more real.\u00a0 Pope Francis merely extols a path which is also our goal. St. Vincent de Paul\u2019s saintly example of charity reminds us of this.<\/p>\n

Guest blogger Jeffrey Marlett<\/strong> blogs at Spiritual Diabetes<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Today is the feast of St. Vincent de Paul (1581-1660). Another post-Reformation era exemplar of holiness, St. Vincent most memorably served the poor.\u00a0 His Congregation of the Mission, the Vincentians (or \u201cLazarists\u201d, named after their founding at the St. Lazarus … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":48,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[21,22,24,1],"tags":[61,221,244],"class_list":["post-1028","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-saints","category-social-justice","category-the-pope","category-uncategorized","tag-charity","tag-pope-francis","tag-saint-vincent-de-paul"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sjcme.edu\/theology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1028","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sjcme.edu\/theology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sjcme.edu\/theology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sjcme.edu\/theology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/48"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sjcme.edu\/theology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1028"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sjcme.edu\/theology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1028\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sjcme.edu\/theology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1028"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sjcme.edu\/theology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1028"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sjcme.edu\/theology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1028"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}