The Love Poverty

(I found an old note I wrote on FB and thought I’d share. Please excuse me if it seems harsh, I think I was having a moment that day. LOL) Disclaimer: I’m a horrible speller by nature and even worse when I go off on a “tangent”, forgive me.

There are many issues in the world today. Abortion, homelessness, illegal immigration, terrorism, the economy, world hunger, human trafficking, drugs and alchol abuse, murder, racism, discrimination, hate crimes, the list goes on and on. Anyone who watches the evening news would be crazy not to think this world is a mess, and rightly so. There are people who take one issue to heart and think that their place is to focus on that ONE issue and beat it like a dead horse til they make their point and when that doesn’t happen become bitter, discontent and frustrated. If you look at this list of issues and don’t see a connection you might want to look closer. They are ALL connected. Every horrible news story you hear is connected to the last one. Teen girls getting pregnant and being victimized by porn pushers and pimps, drug addicts and the illegal Mexican at the food stamp office trying to get help to feed her baby, all are connected. First by the fact that they are all human. What does being human mean? Look at the person next to you and the cat next to them. How do you KNOW they are human and the cat isn’t? Well as Christians we know that we have souls and Bodies and are created in God’s image. So all the people both victims and criminals are created in the image of God. And the only reason they and we exist is that God loves us. If He did not, then we would cease to exist. So think of the Holiest person you can think of and then the most evil and realize that God loves them the exact same. Jesus died for both of them. Their choice to accept that salvation is what makes one Holy and one not Holy. But God loves us all equally. The second way every human in each one of the issues of today is connected by lack of love. Period. The ANSWER to EVERY ONE of these issues is LOVE.

There is a huge lack of love in this world. And it is creating more of the same. (some)Children don’t receive love; they get Ipods. Kids in search of love, find gangs, drugs, sex, alcohol, prostitutes, on and on. Every one of the isses I mentioned ,the ones that are the headline stories on the nightly news, is a person who wasn’t loved. think I’m wrong? Visit a prison. Or a porn studio for that matter. And listen. The stories will be similar, absent parents or over protective parents. But rarely will you hear ” I had a great childhood, that was surrounded by love, and I woke up everyday knowing I was loved unconditionally no matter what” . And for those rare few that do say that, they will have lacked exposure to Jesus. You can ask anyone involved in any of these issues and I promise that they don’t feel validated someway, somehow.  They lack Love. And the lack of love, begets lack of hope. And without hope we have nothing left to lose.

Being Christian is not having a personal agenda. This mission has NOTHING to do with US. This is God’s Mission, and Jesus left us the mission. And it wasn’t abortion PS or to boycott. to write checks to reputable charities, is only a part of our mission. But our mission is to LOVE. When we as Christians love we show others a tiny glimpse into the Love of God.

Here’s part of my story: I grew up not knowing love. My mother loved me, I have no doubt that she still does. She just has no way of knowing how to love much less show it. Her mother didn’t either. I’m not really sure but I’m pretty sure I could go back further and that trend would go way way back. Being kind, understanding and compassionate isn’t something that you will see at one of my family reunions.

The day I met my BFF changed my life, she has loved me through thick and thin. There is nothing I can’t tell her and her love for God is the same as mine, and we’ve both been through the same exact things. If she hadn’t come in my life I think I would’ve jumped off a bridge a long time ago. It was her friendship that made it possible for me to get out of Amarillo and start over in Austin TX. That’s where Stacey came back into my life. His lesson of love is priceless. He can’t stand me sometimes, and is tempted to strangle me on more than one occassion but everyday he wakes up and makes the choice to love me. He’s defintely working towards Sainthood.

Then there’s my mentor. She has no reason to even care about me. I’m not family, she wasn’ t my friend, we didn’t run in the same circles hang out and become girlfriends. She’s more than that to me. She’s an example of who I want to be. She walks this life with a Grace I can only pray that I will have someday. And she loves me. For no reason. I know if I’m in trouble I can call her, but I prefer to just stay out of trouble than to make that phone call. The day after my DWI I was sure that she wasn’t going to ever answer my phone calls ever again, not only did she call me first but she said ” A DWI isn’t a death sentence Leticia, There but for the Grace of God go I, now take a nap and we’ll talk tomorrow”.  Up until that moment in my life I had yet to experience unconditional love. She was by no means proud of me, but she was still there. And is still there to this day, and it’s one of my highest goals in life to never call her while handcuffed in a cop car ever again in my whole life.  Then there’s my probation officer, she had a job to do and never once let me think otherwise. She was sturn, but compassionate, when she saw that God had taken a hold of my heart she let me know she was proud of me, what a great change I had made but never let me forget who she was and what her job was. But still I feel loved when I go in to her office and weirdly I’m gonna miss those meetings.  There are so many other people who have been a part of my journey in life who in their own way have taught me something, who have reached out and helped me when they didn’t have to and had no reason to.  Noe, Martina, Mary Anne, Fr Jonathan, Fr Ablerto, Fr Dean and my CHRP sisters. And people from the past too.

Our Mission as Catholics is not to be smarter about an issue than someone else, to be better than one another but to BE HOLY as Noe said last night. It is my opinion, that through Love we can be Holy and fullfill the Church’s mission, and spread the Good News and conquer all of the issues plaguing this world. Every issue, not just one.

I realize that maybe some people don’t agree with me, some think I’m nuts but hey what’s new? I’ve always been a little crazy, but in the words of Kid Rock ” if you can’t see my heart, you must be blind”.  We can do more than pray, we have an obligation to do more than pray. If prayer was all that was required for salvation then Jesus wouldn’t have died on a cross. That was an ACTION. And an action of love. ( I wonder if you get the theme of love here :)

And our mission as the Church is to LOVE. If you feel you are doing that, then kepp doing it. If not then maybe try to find out what the difference between what your doing and LOVE is. True love.

Here is the mission of the Church as it’s spelled out in the Catechism:

Paragraph 782 of The Catholic Catechism ( the last 4 lines, in reference to the People of God, The Church)

“The status of this people is that of the dignity and freedom of the sons of God, in whose hearts the Holy Spirit dwells as in a temple”

“The law is the new commandment to love as Christ loved us. This the “new” law of the Holy Spirit.”

“It’s Mission is to be salt of the earth and light of the world. This people is “a most sure seed of unity, hope, and salvation for the whole human race”

“It’s desitiny, finally, “is the Kingdom of God which has been begun by God himself on earth and which must be further extended until it has been brought to perfection by him at the end of time.”

John13:34, Romans 8:2, Galations 5:25, Matthew 5:13-16