A REFLECTION the day after the WORLD DAY of the POOR…
“STRETCH FORTH YOUR HAND to the POOR!”
YESTERDAY was “World Day of the POOR”.
Made me realise…
…that being poor was a yesterday for me.
…that being with the poor was a yesterday for me.
…that being for the poor was a yesterday for me.
Sad. So sad.
Made me realise then that being so, I have become more poor than the poor.
When I was young, I was one of the poor in Tondo. Cannot afford a private school. TV-less at home so I needed to go to my cousins’ just to watch Sesame Street. So happy with my World Balance shoes. Adidas and Nike were mere wishful thinking for me. Milo was my drink. Then I started to enjoy Voltes V at home. Then came my first blue Adidas followed by a black Nike. Now I enjoy coffee and it has to be brewed. Oh my, I am not poor anymore.
BEING POOR has become a yesterday for me.
For years and years back then, I was surrounded by poor people. In the Philippines, they were and still are everywhere. In all my assignments as a seminarian and then as a priest, I have been in contact with poor families and communities. The children I have met in Catechism classes in public schools, our students in our PEPT night school, all the fisherfolks, farmers, indigenous people, urban poor I have met during my immersion months, our scholars in our Don Bosco schools, our Bosconians and their parents who approached me for promissory notes, the kids and their families near DBA Mabalacat, the people I have met in our volunteer programs, all the many evacuees after typhoons and those I have met in all our relief giving projects from far-away places like Legazpi, Laguna, Rizal, Pampanga, Tarlac… the poor, I was with them then. Yes, then.
Here in Kuching, for four years now, I am just a priest who does the Sacraments, helping out in the Youth Commission of the Archdiocese. No school nor youth center to run; no scholars to help; no educative and evangelizing institution to manage for the welfare of poor people; no poor children and families to visit and be with, to welcome and play with, to share and pray with, in a chapel, hall or playground of my own. No, none.
Day in and day out, here am I in our Foochow house, often in front of my Apple Mac like I am now, sipping my brewed coffee. The poor who have been with me for years and years, they have not been around me for the past four years. Are there no such poor here in Kuching? If the honest answer is ‘yes’ then that is great, right? But if actually the answer is ‘no, there are’ then why am I not with them?
BEING WITH THE POOR has become a yesterday for me.
I used to have all my passion, manage institution, perform my duties and look for more, if only to do something for the many poor around me. Now, what am I doing for them. Pray. Yes, pray. And my prayer tells me to do more. The poor need more. To stretch my hands for the poor in prayer is not enough. I used to do a lot for the poor then. Now?
BEING FOR THE POOR has become a yesterday for me.
YESTERDAY was “World Day of the POOR”.
Made me realise…
…that being poor was a yesterday for me.
…that being with the poor was a yesterday for me.
…that being for the poor was a yesterday for me.
Sad. So sad.
Made me realise then that being so, I have become more poor than the poor.
TODAY, with God’s grace, I am gonna make my tomorrows like my yesterdays…
poor, with the poor, for the poor.
Join me, please.
Do not make the mistakes I have made then. Do make the decisions I take now.
Let us not, let us never, make the poor our yesterday.
MAY THE POOR BE ALWAYS OUR TODAY… EVERY DAY.
May the poor be there in our spirits. Even if our houses get bigger and better now (we all pray and work so), even if we relocate for greener pastures, our spirits will always be humble and simple, able to find lots of joys in little blessings. Even if we keep on aiming and striving for better lives (and please do so), may our spirits remain glad and grateful for our humble beginnings and for simple blessings. Though we become materially rich and thus more able to offer material help for the materially poor, may we always remain poor in spirit as the Lord calls us to.
I always tell young people, especially my students… “Study well, strive hard. Aim to be rich, why not? Because when you are rich, you can provide well for yourself, for your family AND for others in need even if they are not your family. If you can, do not just be employees. Be employers. Usually, an employee can take care of himself and his family. But an employer can take care of himself and his family and all his employees and their families. I say it again, aim to be rich… not just rich pockets and bank accounts but more so rich hearts. Make your hearts so rich that in them are in the poor and the needy, not just yourself and your family. Yes, be rich but never out of reach.”
May the poor be there in our hearts and minds… always.
Even if we may not be poor anymore or not as poor as before (and may that be so), let the poor remain in our hearts and minds. That concern for their wellness, that consciousness about their plights, that care for them… may these always be in our hearts and minds.
May we think of the poor not only when we see them on the streets or on the news or in social media. No, not enough.
May we think of the poor also if not more so when we are in church and thus pray for them more.
May we think of the poor also when we are in our comfortable homes and thus look around and see what we can share with them. Not our old and crappy surplus but even our precious and fine stuff. That we may learn to share out of charity really and not just out of pity or plenty.
May we think of the poor also when we are in our studies or work and thus consciously desire to do better in our learnings or profession, not only to make our family proud and blessed but also to make the poor in this society suffer a lot less. Let me preach to myself first. I promised to become a priest to be good news to the poor. What has happened to me now? Am I? Am I still? Are you?
May we think of the poor also when we receive our paycheck and thus literally allot a part of it for the needy around us. A relative in need, a neighbor in pain, a fund-raising to support in cash, in kind, or in giving time or service.
May we think of the poor also in so many other ways and places.
Above all, may we think of the poor also if not more so when we look on a mirror and see ourselves… because…
IN YOU AND ME,
COZ WE CHOOSE THEM TO BE,
THE POOR AND THE NEEDY
WILL ALWAYS BE THERE LOVINGLY.
In our world now of poverty, pain, pandemic and so many other global and gigantic issues, it is high time to stretch out our hands to the poor. But we will and can only do so if in our hearts and minds, in ourselves, they are there.
Thank you yesterday’s ‘World Day of the Poor’.
You have made the poor not anymore my yesterday.
You have made the poor MY WORLD and MY TODAY.
May this be my every day.
Fr Ramon Borja, SDB
Commission for Youth
