I have written before of my experiences with the poor, and those who serve them. And I’ve written of how I knew people who live among them; they are extremely happy people. The happiness among the poor is contagious. I remember the head of the large organization who went on a vacation to India and wanted to meet Mother Teresa while there. The woman quit her job and never went home. Despite all her money and fame in this country, there in the slums of India she found true happiness. I am blessed to know of (and support) a goodly number of such people who have found a heaven on this earth. Why aren’t there more?
I’m sure there are many I’m not aware of, and I just finished a book about one of them, Fr. Richard Ho Lung, who founded the Missionaries of the Poor (MOP). Thank you Mark and Sarah for the present of this book! The book is entitled “Candles in the Dark” --- and as I write this, I am reminded of how each week I light a vigil candle at the foot of the statues of Mary and Joseph, and I pray to them to intercede for me to become a small light in this world for those the Lord puts in my path. Fr. Lung lives what I take a moment to do. Most people of our culture are in one way or another seeking a heaven on this earth. Fr. Lung, Mother Teresa, Fr. Groeschel and others would say they live there, among the poor. They see the face of Jesus in the poor, and how extremely and easily happy the poor are, and so they choose to join them. I also now recall the time I went to a meeting and sat next to a mentally challenged young lady, and how after the meeting she came over and, with a big smile, hugged and thanked me for sitting next to her.
They love so much.
In this book Joseph Pearce has captured many moments of people visiting the MOP, and being astonished how happy they are, and how they love one another, and this visitor. Those stories alone make this book a good read. But these words struck me so I just repeat them:
“It would be very easy to scoff at these infectiously enthusiastic accounts of the happiness of Father Ho Lung and the brothers and especially perhaps at the claims that the destitute and disabled to whom the brothers minister are joyful, loving, and happy. Surely their lives must be miserable. What do the severely disabled, those dying of AIDS and the homeless have to celebrate? Indeed, if we are tempted to think in unison with the spokesmen of the culture of death, might we not reasonably believe that these people would be better off dead? Shouldn’t the disabled have been killed in the womb, sparing them a “quality of life” that is not worth living? Wouldn’t the parents of the disabled have been more responsible if they had snuffed out the defective lives of their children, thereby sparing themselves and the wider community (if such a heartless society can be called a community) the burden of caring for them, and wouldn’t they also have been saving the children themselves from the burden of life in such deformed bodies? And as for the seriously ill or disabled adults, or those dying of diseases such as AIDS, wouldn’t it be much more humane to offer them euthanasia, the “happy death” that will enable them to escape from their misery and suffering? Such are the questions prompted by a culture which believes that the Cross of suffering must be avoided at all costs. There is in such a culture no “right to choose” for babies who are slaughtered during pregnancy. There is no “right to choose” for the mentally handicapped who are euthanized because they are not able to express their desire to live. It is for this reason that the disabled and destitute at the MOP centers are witnesses for the culture of life and are an affront to the culture of death. Anyone who visits the centers, and this should serve as a challenge to the scoffers and denizens of the death culture, will see the joy and happiness on the faces of those who live there. They will experience the love that the residents have for those who visit them, the love that they have for the brothers who serve them, and the love that they have for each other. Theirs is a life that is not merely endured, but a life full of joy.
If all men are created equal, it is because they are created in the image of God. It is for this reason that Father Ho Lung and the brothers see the face of Christ in the faces of the poor and disabled. Only those who reject the divine presence in man can see in the faces of the poor and disabled the features of a sub-human and disposable “reject” or “loser”. Only those who reject the divine presence in man can deny others the right to choose life while simultaneously giving themselves the right to kill others on the altar of convenience. The disabled and homeless in the MOP centers serve, therefore, as powerful witnesses of the desire for life and the power of love. … Seeing such joy on the suffering face of Christ in his brothers and sisters was the greatest present that the ghetto priest (Fr. Lung on his birthday) could desire.”
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I have not traveled to poor countries or slum areas but I am blessed to have met those who have lived there. I do a small thing for their charities, and we pray for each other. I have no knowledge of what Jesus thinks of me, but I know there are children who pray for me --- and I am sure Jesus hears their prayers. It is my little share of heaven here on earth.
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