I was astonished recently to hear a young person who claimed to be Christian refer to the poor as “worthless.” A recent perusal of X, after years of not signing in, revealed that some of my Catholic brothers and sisters often espouse similar views about immigrants, their political opponents, pro-abortion ideologues, LGBT, the sick “weighing down” the healthcare system, and the poor, who they view as “free loaders.” I was very quickly reminded why I deleted or deactivated all my social media accounts after reading threads in response to president-elect Trump’s victory last week. Needless to say, I deleted my long dormant X account.
One of the great dangers we face as Catholics in a polarized world is to misconstrue our own political leanings and personal repugnance towards certain peoples as being from Christ. Catholic Social Teaching shows us how to live charitably in complex situations such as the crisis facing the U.S. southern border. It is not an either/or proposition, which is what both sides tend to do. They select one aspect of Catholic Social Teaching and ignore the rest. It is meant to be read as a harmonious whole that gets in the way of our tendency towards extremes, injustice, and lack of charity towards those we dislike.
Our current age is dominated by politics. It is the false idol of our time, which is the same as previous periods in history. The Apostles expected Christ to usher in a worldly kingdom. Instead, He died on the Cross and triumphed over sin and death through the resurrection. His ways are not our own. We wrongly believe that the Lord wants to transform the world primarily through political power and dominance.
This has been a problem since the Pharisees stirred the crowd to cry out for Barrabas as the Lord stood before them scourged, crowned with thorns, and beaten. Our hope is not in princes, the Psalmist tells us (Psalm 146:3-4). We can breathe a sigh of relief when candidates win who will seek to end the reign of wokeism, but we should not pretend that good has finally triumphed over evil. Pope Francis and the USCCB cautioned Catholics that those who voted were looking for the “lesser of two evils.” We do not celebrate evil. We recognize that we live in a deeply corrupt and post-Christian age that will challenge us in ways our generation has never known.
The more important question facing us is: Do we love the people Christ loves? Our political enemies, the poor, the immigrant, the unborn, the transgender person, and the other are all made in the image and likeness of God. They have inherent dignity that we must always keep before us, even when having to make difficult decisions about who can come into our country and who cannot. We should not ignore the misery and poverty that has led many people to come here. It is a great tragedy that many of these people face risks of human trafficking, violence, drugs, corruption, and other horrors in their home countries.
One of the issues with social media today is that we have relegated the sufferings of others to abstraction and ideas. We live in virtual worlds of our own creation. Our social media platforms become echo chambers of our ideas, even the worst ideas. Most Catholics do not serve in ministry among the poor, migrants, sick, unborn, lost, and needy. As a long-time ministry volunteer and former staff member, I can honestly say it is like pulling teeth to get people to serve. If everyone was serving in some capacity, our culture would transform overnight.
What this virtual world is doing is creating a Catholic online world that is filled with people who have never stared into the eyes of a homeless person, drug addicted mother, baby saved from abortion, woke ideologue writhing in pain in the hospital, or the obstinate dying person who says no to Christ. This is much harder than espousing political beliefs online. This is to walk into darkened tombs and the darkness of the Cross. It is to set aside our own preconceived notions about people and to allow our hearts to be pierced by their misery. If we were serving and loving as Christ loves, then our hearts of stone would begin to melt into hearts of flesh.
I say this because I spent years as a hardened conservative ideologue. I am still much too hard-hearted, but through repeated sufferings of my own and walking with others in their sufferings, the Lord was able to begin softening that hardness. There are still areas where I struggle a great deal, so I will not pretend that I have a heart of flesh quite yet (Ezekiel 36:26). What I do know is that the only way to grow in loving those Christ loves is to enter their misery. To step away from the keyboard and to walk into the needs of others who are different from us.
Christ is waiting for us there. He longs to show us His face in the poor, the ignorant, the sick, and the lowly. There have been three powerful moments in my life when I saw the Lord in the poor. The same people deemed “worthless” by too many people. The first was a couple of years ago when I offered a bag of snacks, toiletries, and holy cards that I keep in my car to a woman who was begging from her wheelchair. In that moment, I was flooded with the most intense outpouring of supernatural charity towards this person that all I could do was look at her with the radiant love of Christ. He wanted to use me to let her know that He sees her. She seemed stunned by such an outpouring of His love, but He met her in that moment through my willingness to reach out to her.
The second was nearly a year ago when I was visiting friends in an area of the state that is known for its tourism and rich retirees. As I was running an errand, I saw three different men on street corners with signs asking for help. I ran into Trader Joe’s and purchased a sandwich and bottle of water for each of them. When I came to the third gentleman, I gave him the food and water, and he was filled with the most profound gratitude I have experienced. He went back to his spot and stared into my eyes with that same radiant love that I had given the homeless woman previously. Christ pierced my own brokenness through this gentleman’s gratitude.
As I drove away, I was filled with tremendous awe and wonder. I met Christ in the suffering poverty of this man, and very unexpectantly, the Lord blessed me with a glimpse of Himself. The poverty of this man was so great that he was filled with Christ. Like St. Martin of Tours, I encountered Christ as I provided for another personally.
The third experience was recent and very similar to the second. I was in a hurry trying to get back to school to teach the three remaining classes I had for the day. I was picking up a coffee and breakfast, when I saw a man begging near the parking lot entrance. I ordered him a sandwich with my order and drove up to him to give it to him. When I gave it to him, he was filled with immense gratitude. He looked into my eyes with thanksgiving and charity. I drove away knowing that I had once more seen Christ. I shared the story with my students in the hope of helping them to see that we encounter Christ in the suffering poor, as St. Teresa of Calcutta taught.
We grow spiritually in the measure of charity we open ourselves up to. As St. John of the Cross so aptly put it: “In the evening of this life, we will be judged on charity alone.” This charity is learned first and foremost through a life of prayer. What I am suggesting is not the empty social justice trope that we have been inundated with for decades. That is a lifeless form of service that has been stripped of Christ’s supernatural power and charity. Rather, our union with Christ through prayer leads us to serve with open hearts. Prayer leads us to encounter Christ in the Tabernacle, but also to encounter Christ in the poor and in our enemy.
If our Catholic faith was lived in prayer and service to the suffering, the polarization in our country would begin to heal. The more we cling to our ideas at the expense of charity towards others, the greater the divide becomes. If instead we sought to understand the other, even without agreeing, we would find greater healing.
My husband and I learned this important lesson two days before the election when we stood in a darkened hospital room of a woman who was completely overcome with wokeism. She was trapped in the lies to such an extent that she could not see reality. She had created a Jesus of her own imagining that fit her political ideology to a T. What I saw was how politics on both sides can become all consuming and a false idol that blinds us. I was like her 15 years ago, except on the conservative side.
I also saw how deeply broken this person was and how much she needed the true Christ’s healing. After we prayed with her and walked out, I turned to my husband and said: “She has experienced some kind of trauma or deep wound that has led her here. Perhaps divorce or abuse or an abortion?” It is her wounding that I saw, not a dangerous ideologue to conquer. I saw how much Christ loves her and wants to save her from the darkened tomb she has fallen into.
Do we see those who are trapped in lies and sin with the eyes of compassion or derision? Based on social media, the answer is the latter, which is one of the major reasons why we have been unable to evangelize the culture. Our triumphalism in the face of perceived victory can very quickly become our undoing as we fail in our evangelical call to love our enemies and to pray for those who persecute us. And when we fail to recognize the evil on our own side.
Do we see the poor, immigrant, political enemy, sick, or burdensome with the eyes of Christ? Are we willing to go into darkened tombs to bring others to the glory of the resurrection or are we too busy hiding behind the triumphalism of our screens?
Photo by Tom Parsons on Unsplash
