Lake County Ohio Weal

   ON LOVE OF THE POOR  Apostolic Exhortation: Dilexi Te Pope Leo CHAPTER ONE A FEW ESSENTIAL WORDS 4. Jesus’ disciples criticized the woman who poured costly perfumed oil on his head. They said: “Why this waste? For this ointment could have been sold for a large sum, and the money given to the poor.”  However, the Lord said to them in response: “You always have the poor with you, but you will not always have me” (Mt 26:8-9,11).  That woman saw in Jesus the lowly and suffering Messiah on whom she could pour out all her love. What comfort that anointing must have brought to the very head that within a few days would be pierced by thorns! It was a small gesture, of course, but those who suffer know how great even a small gesture of affection can be, and how much relief it can bring.  Jesus understood this and told the disciples that the memory of her gesture would endure: “Wherever this good news is proclaimed in the whole world, what she has done will be tol...

  ON LOVE OF THE POOR  Apostolic Exhortation DELIXI TE of Pope Leo 1. “I HAVE LOVED YOU” (Rev 3:9). The Lord speaks these words to a Christian community that, unlike some others, had no influence or resources, and was treated instead with violence and contempt: 2. This declaration of love, taken from the Book of Revelation, reflects the inexhaustible mystery that Pope Francis reflected upon in the Encyclical Dilexit Nos on the human and divine love of the heart of Jesus Christ 3. For this reason, in continuity with the Encyclical Dilexit Nos, Pope Francis was preparing in the last months of his life an Apostolic Exhortation on the Church’s care for the poor, to which he gave the title Dilexi Te, as if Christ speaks those words to each of them, saying: “You have but little power,” yet “I have loved you” ( Rev 3:9).  I am happy to make this document my own — adding some reflections —