NAME OF PROGRAM: New Life
PRESENTER: Kimberly Kramar
TOPIC: Poverty of Spirit
PROGRAM
# 8
Live transmission: Monday, april 3, 2017
Time: Miami 7:00pm
Link: https://jcn.network Comcast 235
E-mail: newlife@jcn.network
SPECIAL GUESTS: Cristy Villaseñor, Kiki Troia,
Marco López, Margarita Araux and MaryCarmen Barria
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Purpose of message:
Discover the need to give all areas of our life to
Jesus, by identifying the bonds that limit us to reach a full relationship
with God.
We will recognize our humanity with its
selfishness: attachments, impulses, needs for approval, success, power,
possessions, recognition of achievements, etc.; the sin and the spiritual
bonds that it entails.
In the light of the Letter to the Romans we will
recognize if we are living according to the "flesh" or according to
the "spirit". We will also learn how to pray for full freedom and
joy and peace in Christ, asking for the grace of the Holy Spirit to live
proclaiming with St. Paul: "I live no longer, but Christ lives in
me" (Gal 2, 20).
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Matt 5, 3 Blessed are the
poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
What does "poor in spirit" mean?
"When
the Son of God became man, he chose a path of poverty, of humiliation. As St.
Paul says in the Letter to the Philippians: "Have the sentiments of
Christ Jesus among you. Who, being of divine condition, did not avidly retain
the being equal to God; On the contrary, he emptied himself by taking on the
condition of a slave, made like men "(2,5-7). Jesus is God who divests
himself of his glory. Here we see the choice of poverty on the part of God:
being rich, he became poor to enrich us with his poverty (2 Cor 8,9). It is
the mystery that we contemplate in the nativity, seeing the Son of God in a
manger, and then on a cross, where humiliation reaches the end.
The Greek
adjective ptochós (poor) not only has a material meaning, but also means
"beggar." It is linked to the Jewish concept of anawim, the
"poor of Yahweh", which evokes humility, awareness of one's own limits,
one's existential condition of poverty. The anawim trust in the Lord, they
know that they depend on Him.
Jesus, as
Saint Theresa of the Child Jesus perfectly understood, in his Incarnation he
appears as a beggar, a needy person in search of love. The Catechism of the
Catholic Church speaks of man as a "beggar of God" (No. 2559) and
tells us that prayer is the meeting of God's thirst with our thirst (# 2560).
St.
Francis of Assisi understood very well the secret of the Bliss of the poor in
spirit. In fact, when Jesus spoke to him in the person of the leper and in
the Crucifix, he recognized the greatness of God and his own condition of
humility. In prayer, the Poverello spent hours asking the Lord, "Who are
you? Who I am?". She divested herself of a comfortable and carefree life
to marry the "Lady Poverty", to imitate Jesus and follow the Gospel
to the letter. Francis lived inseparably the imitation of the poor Christ and
the love of the poor, like the two sides of the same coin."
Pope Francisco, message for
XXIX WYD 2014
• Seek the essentials: Jesus first
• Freedom in relation to things: sobriety,
detachment
• Sensitivity to the material and spiritual
poor: unemployed, migrants, dependents, unloved, hopeless, discouraged,
disillusioned, cowed...
• Recognize that the poor are like teachers
for conversion: they also have something to offer us, to teach us: a person
is not valuable for what he has in the bank, but for his humility and trust
in God
• Poor in spirit: way of evangelization,
joyful for the lordship of God, heirs of the kingdom of the heavens
Matt 10, 9 -10 Do not take gold or silver
or copper for your belts; no sack for the journey, or
a second tunic, or sandals, or walking stick. The laborer deserves his keep.
"The
Kingdom is both a gift and a promise. It has already been given to us in
Jesus, but it must still be fulfilled in fullness. Therefore we ask the
Father every day: "Your kingdom come".
Pope Francisco
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Col 3, 1 – 10 If then you were raised with Christ, seek what is
above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. Think of what is above, not
of what is on earth. For you have died, and your
life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ your life appears, then you too will
appear with him in glory. Put to death, then, the parts of you that are
earthly: immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and the
greed that is idolatry. (…)
Stop lying to one
another, since you have taken off the old self with its practices and have put on the new
self, which is being renewed, for knowledge, in the image of its creator.
The attachment:
Attachment
is the affection, esteem and affection that an individual feels for another
person or for a certain thing that can be an object, a good, among others,
and that implies an important and intense empathy.
http://www.definicionabc.com/social/apego.php
"Attachment
is an emotional state that has two approaches, one positive and one negative.
The first is the state of pleasure and emotion that we feel when we achieve
in our lives that which we are attached to. As for the negative, it is the
sense of threat and tension that accompany it, which makes us vulnerable to
emotional disorder and constantly threatens to unbalance our tranquility ...When
we can not conceive of life without the presence of those things or those
people. Then, it is clear that simple affection has been transformed into
dependency. "
Attachment to sin:
"It
refers to those pleasant memories for past sins that were already
forgiven".
Catholicism for Dummies
...
"Our true enemy is attachment to sin, which can lead to the failure of
our existence. Jesus dismisses the adulterous woman with this slogan:
"Go away, and from now on sin no more." He grants forgiveness, so
that "from now on" he does not sin anymore. (...) Here it is
emphasized that only divine forgiveness and his love received with an open
and sincere heart give us the strength to resist evil and "sin no
more", to let us conquer by the love of God, which becomes Our strength.
In this way, the attitude of Jesus becomes a model to be followed by every
community, called to make love and forgiveness the throbbing heart of his
life».
Homily of S.S. Benedict XVI,
March 25, 2007
"The Lord condemns sin, not the sinner"
Saint Agustin
Emotional or affective attachment:
"Emotional
or affective attachment is not love. It is a problem of dependence on the
other person. The 'attached' leaves aside his own life, his personality, his
tastes, his friends... to follow the other person in everything he does.
https://goo.gl/dS1hTw
"To
depend on the person you love is a way of burying yourself in life, an act of
psychological self-mutilation where self-love, self-respect and the essence
of oneself are offered and given away irrationally. When attachment is
present, surrender, rather than an act of selfless and generous affection, is
a form of capitulation, a surrender guided by fear in order to preserve the
good that the relationship offers. Under the disguise of romantic love, the
attached person begins to suffer a slow and relentless depersonalization to
become an annex of the person 'beloved', a simple appendix”.
https://goo.gl/B3e42O
Material attachments:
Rom 6, 1 – 11 What then shall we say? Shall we persist in sin that grace may abound?
Of course not! How can we who died to sin yet
live in it? Or are you unaware that we who were baptized into Christ
Jesus were baptized into his death? We were indeed buried with him through
baptism into death, so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the
glory of the Father, we too might live in newness of life. For if we have
grown into union with him through a death like his, we shall also be united
with him in the resurrection. We know that our old self was crucified
with him, so that our sinful body might be done away with, that we might no
longer be in slavery to sin. For a dead person has been absolved from sin. If, then, we have died
with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him. We know that
Christ, raised from the dead, dies no more; death no longer has power over
him. As to his death, he died to sin once and for all; as to his life, he
lives for God. Consequently, you too must think of yourselves as [being] dead
to sin and living for God in Christ Jesus.
I do not live anymore:
Gal 6, 14 But may I never boast except in the cross of
our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and
I to the world.
• Dying the "old man"
• Dying to passions (Col 3: 5-10)
• Dying to sin (St 1: 14-15)
• Dying to power - fame - and
recognitions
• Dying to pride (2 Cor 10, 13)
• Dying to envy (Prov 14:30)
• Dying to jealousy (St 3, 14-15)
• Dying to desires of revenge and
justice (Heb 10:30)
• Dying to have to please everyone
• Dying to perfectionism
• Dying to defenses
• Dying to fears
• Dying to insecurities
• Dying to anger
• Dying to divisions
• Dying to bad habits: lack of
discipline, greed, laziness, excesses, obsessions and all physiological, emotional
and spiritual attachments
If it still hurts you, it bothers you, it bothers you ... is that it
has not yet died in your life.
"In
proclaiming the Beatitudes, Jesus invites us to follow him, to walk with him
in the way of love, the only one that leads to eternal life. It is not an
easy road, but the Lord assures us of His grace and never leaves us alone.
Poverty, afflictions, humiliations, struggle for justice, fatigue in daily
conversion, difficulties to live the call to holiness, persecutions and many
other challenges are present in our lives. But if we open the door to Jesus,
if we let Him be in our life, if we share with Him the joys and the
sufferings, we will experience a peace and a joy that only God, infinite
love, can give
(...) If
you really allow the deepest aspirations of your heart to emerge, you will
realize that there is an inextinguishable desire for happiness in you, and
this will allow you to unmask and reject so many offers "cheaply"
that you find around you. When we look for success, pleasure, selfishness and
turn into idols, we may experience moments of drunkenness, a false sense of
satisfaction, but in the end we become slaves, we are never satisfied, and we
feel the need to seek each Again. It is very sad to see a youth
"tired," but weak. "
Pope Francisco, message for
XXIX WYD 2014
The vanity:
Gal 5, 25 – 26 If we live in the Spirit, let us also follow
the Spirit. Let us not be conceited, provoking one another, envious of one
another.
• The Holy Spirit gives us the rightness of
intention
"Vanity is dangerous, Makes us fall into
pride and pride "
Pope Francisco
Prov 16, 18 – 19 Pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before stumbling. It is
better to be humble in spirit with the lowly than to divide the spoil
with the proud.
Pride:
"There is a way which is
certainly not that of salvation, nor that of happiness, and by which - but
nevertheless - we often enter men with great ease. (...) The route of pride
has a rather sad beginning because it begins with the denial of God in our
souls and in our lives. (...) Pride, in fact, is nothing more than a
disorderly estimate of one's own talents and talents. (...) The route of
pride is a labyrinth in which souls become disoriented and lost. Pride
destroys the simplicity of souls, that being and appear without folds -sine
plicis- which is a charming characteristic of the humble people "
P. Salvador Canals, Ascetic
Meditation, 31 ed., 2014
Ps 10, 2 – 4 In pride the wicked hotly pursue the afflicted; let them
be caught in the plots which they have devised. For the wicked boasts
of his heart’s desire, and the greedy man curses and spurns
the Lord. The wicked, in the haughtiness of his countenance, does
not seek Him. All his thoughts are, “There is no God.”
Prov 8, 13 “The fear of the Lord is to
hate evil; pride and arrogance and the evil way and the perverted
mouth, I hate.
"The Beatitudes of Jesus are bearers of a revolutionary novelty,
of a model of happiness opposite to that usually communicated to us by the
media, the dominant opinion. For the worldly mind, it is a scandal that God
has come to become one of us, who has died on a cross. In the logic of this
world, those who Jesus proclaims blessed are considered "losers",
weak. On the other hand, success is exalted at all costs, the welfare, the
arrogance of power, the affirmation of self to the detriment of others.
Pope Francisco, message for XXIX WYD 2014
John 15, 5 – 6 I am the vine, you are the branches. Whoever
remains in me and I in him will bear much fruit, because without me you can
do nothing. Anyone who does not remain in me will be thrown out like a branch
and wither; people will gather them and throw them into a fire and they will
be burned.
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What does "stripping" mean and how do we get rid of our
ties?
"Despoiling
is depriving someone of his or her own will of something through deception or
physical or moral violence. Dispossession is synonymous with looting,
undressing, booty and plunder."
Eph 4, 21 – 24 assuming that you have heard of him and were
taught in him, as truth is in Jesus, that you should put away the old self of
your former way of life, corrupted through deceitful desires, and be renewed
in the spirit of your minds, and put on the new self, created in God's
way in righteousness and holiness of truth.
1 Cor 2, 14 – 16 Now the natural person does not accept what pertains to the
Spirit of God, for to him it is foolishness, and he cannot understand it,
because it is judged spiritually. The spiritual person, however, can judge
everything but is not subject to judgment by anyone. For "who has
known the mind of the Lord, so as to counsel him? "But we have the mind
of Christ.
Rom 8, 5 For those who live according to the flesh are
concerned with the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the
spirit with the things of the spirit.
• The difference between the detachment of
the priests / religious and the laity
Phil 2, 4 – 8 each looking out not for his own interests,
but [also] everyone for those of others. Have among yourselves the same
attitude that is also yours in Christ Jesus, Who, though he was in the form
of God, did not regard equality with God something to be grasped. Rather, he
emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, coming in human likeness; and
found human in appearance, he humbled himself, becoming obedient to death,
even death on a cross.
""He
emptied himself "does not in any way mean that he ceased to be God: it
would be absurd! On the contrary, it means, as the Apostle insightfully
states, that "he did not avidly retain being" equal to God,
"but" being in the form of God "(" in form Dei ") -
as the true God-Son - He assumed a human nature deprived of glory, subject to
suffering and death, in which to live obedience to the Father to the extreme
sacrifice”.
P. John
Paul II, General Audience, February 17, 1988
"In
Christian theology, kenosis is the emptying of one's will to become fully
receptive to the will of God."
Wikipedia
• How to live detached in the family?
Living according
to the Spirit:
Gal 5, 16 – 17 I say, then: live by the Spirit and you will certainly not gratify
the desire of the flesh. For the flesh has desires against the Spirit, and
the Spirit against the flesh; these are opposed to each other, so that you
may not do what you want.
"To
live according to the spirit" means to seek God above all things and to
fight, with his grace, against his own inclination to evil and to sin. This
task may seem impossible, if we rely only on our strengths, but Christ has
come in the flesh to condemn sin and to give us His Spirit. In this way, with
the power of the Holy Spirit who dwells in us, we can overcome sin and death,
the flesh and the bondage of the Law. The destiny of this new mode of
existence is the resurrection and eternal life; That is, full participation
in the victory of Christ. We can, therefore, realize the authentic vocation
of man; Which is the vocation to charity, to the love that unites us to God
and that builds solidarity among us”.
Guillermo Morado, en http://infocatolica.com
Mary, poor in spirit:
Lc 1, 47 – 49 my spirit rejoices in God my savior. For he
has looked upon his handmaid’s lowliness; behold, from now on will all ages
call me blessed. The Mighty One has done great things for me, and holy is his
name.
• The poverty of Mary, an option of life and
the soul
• He gave up everything except his one good:
God
• Instead of complaining, bitterness, anger,
out of his condition took virtue: joy, comfort, hope
• She was happy to see herself among the
hungry, whom God fills with celestial goods:
John 1, 46 But Nathanael said to him, "Can anything
good come from Nazareth?" Philip said to him, "Come and see."
"No
other virtue is in fact so despised and so little and ill-known, so ignored
and deformed, as this Christian virtue. The virtue of humility is a humble
virtue”
P.
Salvador Canals, Ascetic Meditation
Matt 11, 29 Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am meek and humble of
heart; and you will find rest for yourselves.
How to live in
the world and not be of the world:
• The sentence
• The sacraments
• Humility
• The detachment
• Love
• Generosity
• The service
• Imitation of the saints
• Intercession of the Virgin Mary and
consecration to her
• Heaven and Hell Awareness
• Disclaimers: acknowledgments, applause,
etc.
Closing
prayer: Phil 1, 20 – 21 My eager expectation and hope is that I shall
not be put to shame in any way, but that with all boldness, now as always,
Christ will be magnified in my body, whether by life or by death. For to me
life is Christ, and death is gain.
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