Poverty Studies

Following the example of better people, I brought home to Brooklyn a metal trashcan converted to a composter which I bought in Union Square. I had a little cart to wheel it home on, and to reduce my load it made sense to put my shoulder bag containing my wallet in the rubbish pail, which was an odd feeling. Ok, I am now putting my wallet with my paycheck in this shiny new trashcan...

Most likely I was a little influenced by the book I just finished, The Road to Assisi, The Essential Biography of St. Francis by Paul Sabatier, written in 1894, because the Saint seems like a very good guide in times like these when we need to clearly view the upside of the downturn. Really, less is more? Really? For the Poverello of Umbria, poverty was freedom from conflict, and where Brooke Shields wouldn't let anything come between her and her Calvins, Francis would never let any Calvins come between him and his Jesus. Hardcore!

Of Francis' ascetisism G.K. Chesterton eloquently wrote "It was not self-denial merely in the sense of self-control. It was as positive as a passion, it had all the air of being as positive as a pleasure... The whole point of him was that the secret of recovering the natural pleasures lay in regarding them in the light of a supernatural pleasure." (Chesteron, pp. 73, 64)

His words make me wonder what things stand in the way of realizing the greatest wealth, the ability to deeply value the smallest thing, whether pleasant or painful, as the richest gift possible, hand-picked by a divine beloved.

Sabatier's conception of the Saint's devotion to poverty has more to do with freedom. "St. Francis renounced everything so he might better possess everything. The lives of the immense majority of our contemporaries are ruled by the fatal error that the more one possesses the more one enjoys. Our exterior, civil liberties continually increase, but at the same time our inward freedom is taking flight. How many are there among us who are literally possessed by what we possess?" Sabatier, p. 64

Of course the study of the freedoms and joys granted by liberation from temporal fixations is not limited to Catholic ascetisim, and I'm sure there's many related ideas from a bounty of traditions that would round out the subject.