Today’s Gospel reflection focuses on the Beatitudes, the heart and soul of Jesus’ metaphysical understanding of the spiritual life. It begins with the iconic words, “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for the kingdom of God belongs to them.” To properly understand the meaning of Jesus’ profound statement, we must situate it within the context of the struggle between the ego and the soul or the Divine Image within us.
The ego is that part of us that is entirely empty and therefore driven by a desperate need to fill this emptiness. Out of this desperation the ego grabs onto to anything that might bring it a measure of fulfillment and stability. Of course, because the ego chooses in desperation, it chooses wrongly, which only increases its sense of desperate grasping after some form of pleasure, prestige, and power. Still deeper, the ego’s drives are divergent; the ego is literally tearing itself apart because of these contrary drives, which further increase its desperation, and the cycle goes on and on. This is the point: there is no room for truth, beauty, or goodness in the ego’s ravenous appetite for fulfillment.
In another Gospel passage, Jesus provides us with the resolution to the ego’s predicament, saying, “ Man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.” Our real sustenance is the grace and the love that flows from God to our souls. Yet, for God’s grace to freely flow, we must embrace “Lady Poverty,” as Francis said, letting go of our happiness projects so that we can receive the God’s unlimited wisdom and bliss, the true source of our happiness. Valentin Tomberg gives an enlightened understanding of spiritual poverty, writing, “The vow of poverty is the practice of inner emptiness that is established as a consequence of the silence of personal desires, emotions, and imagination, so that the soul may be capable of receiving the revelation of the Word, the life and the light from above. Poverty is the active perpetual vigil and waiting in the face of eternal sources of creativity; it is the soul ready for what is new and unexpected; it is the aptitude to learn always and everywhere; it is the precondition of all illumination, all revelation, and all initiation.”
In a similar spirit Yogananda tells us, “When the spirit of man mentally renounces desire for objects of this world, knowing them to be illusory, perishable, misleading, and unbecoming to the soul, he begins to find true joy in acquiring permanently satisfying soul qualities. And humbly leading a life of outer simplicity and inner renunciation, steeped in the soul’s heavenly bliss and wisdom, the devotee ultimately inherits the lost kingdom of immortal blessedness.”
Jesus, Divine Master,
You taught me,
“Blessed are the poor in spirit.”
May I be ready for
The active perpetual vigil,
The waiting for creative solutions,
The new and unexpected, and
The aptitude to learn, always and everywhere.
