I want to take this opportunity to thank all of you for your generosity to the St. Vincent de Paul Society last weekend.  As I write this, I do not have the number of how much was collected, but if past years are any indication, I know the amount will make a bit impact in the lives of so many people.

    I mentioned that at this year’s Diocesan Priests Convocation, Fr. Marty McGeough, CM -- a Vincentian priest -- gave the conferences.  Last week, I summarized this first talk on “Developing the Spirit of the Poor.”  His second talk focused on another Beatitude:  “Blessed are the Meek.”

    A lot of us have a difficult time with the idea of meekness.  Too often we think that being meek means being soft, a floormat that people walk across.  None of us like to be conned or robbed.  Just a month ago, here in the parish, we had a man who was trying to con people with a story about having a family member die (to some it was a son, to others a daughter, and yet to others his wife), asking them for money so he could get someplace.  He even tried to break into the candle box money after saying he just wanted to light a candle for his loved one.  So yes, there are liars and cheats in the world, but we cannot allow them to close our hearts to those who really are in need.

    Meekness is a spirit of gentleness with the people we encounter who are in real need.  It involves not reducing people to objects of “charity,” but recognizing them as subjects, as children of God like ourselves.  Yet meekness goes one further step; it looks beyond just the physical world to see the divine, the supernatural, in what and who is in front of us.  We need to read Matthew 25:31-46 in this light; it is the passage on the Judgement of the Nations, where Jesus tells us that when we feed the hungry, give a drink to the thirsty, visit the sick, etc., we do it for HIM.

    When we encounter those on the margins of society we need to learn to look beyond the surface labels, and see Christ.  Ultimately we are called to serve Jesus Christ, so we must see Him in the people we help.  When we take that perspective, we will worry less about being conned, lied to, and cheated, for we will be happy serving Christ and doing His will.

    This is what the members of the St. Vincent de Paul Society does.  They are not dummies; they realize that they have probably given help to people who have lied about their need.  They do their best to avoid that, but they rather err on the side of seeing Christ in the poor.

In setting up what would become the St. Vincent de Paul Society, St. Vincent realized that as a work of mercy, it was not just about feeding and clothing the poor.  As he received more and more donations, he realized that he needed to organize the work.  Our local conference does that, working as a team to help the most people with what they have.

St. Vincent also recognized that it was not just physical poverty that needs to be served.  The spiritual poverty in people’s lives is just important.  We need to help awaken in people their sense of their spiritual poverty, to look beyond their worldly concerns, and see the needs of their souls.

Ultimately we need to trust in the power of God’s Word, then meet people in meekness, so as to serve them in mercy.