“Private property does not constitute an unconditional and absolute right, and that no one is authorized to reserve for their exclusive use what he does not need, when others lack necessities.”- Paul VI -Populorum Progressio
“The Church’s love for the poor is a part of her constant tradition”. - John Paul II, Centissimus Annus
“God gave the earth to the whole human race for the sustenance of all its members, without excluding or favoring anyone.” - Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church
The Universal Destination of Goods is..“The first principle of the whole ethical and social order” and “the characteristic principle of Catholic social doctrine” - John Paul II
CCC 2445 Love for the poor is incompatible with immoderate love of riches or their selfish use:
“Come now, you rich, weep and howl for the miseries that are coming upon you. Your riches have rotted and your garments are moth-eaten. Your gold and silver have rusted, and their rust will be evidence against you and will eat your flesh like fire. You have laid up treasure for the last days. Behold, the wages of the laborers who mowed your fields, which you kept back by fraud, cry out; and the cries of the harvesters have reached the ears of the Lord of hosts. You have lived on the earth in luxury and in pleasure; you have fattened your hearts in a day of slaughter. You have condemned, you have killed the righteous man; he does not resist you.” (James 5:1-6)
CCC 2446 St. John Chrysostom vigorously recalls this: “Not to enable the poor to share in our goods is to steal from them and deprive them of life. The goods we possess are not ours, but theirs.” “The demands of justice must be satisfied first of all; that which is already due in justice is not to be offered as a gift of charity”
“When we attend to the needs of those in want, we give them what is theirs, not ours. More than performing works of mercy, we are paying a debt of justice.” - Gregory the Great
“If you have two coats, you’ve stolen one from the poor.”- Servant of God Dorothy Day
“The bread which you hold back belongs to the hungry; the coat, which you guard in your locked storage-chests, belongs to the naked.”- St Basil the Great
“By a certain wily artifice of the devil, countless pretexts of expenditure are proposed to the rich.” St Basil the Great
“Detachment from riches is obligatory for entrance into the Kingdom of heaven.” CCC2544
“Our Lord warns us that we shall be separated from Him if we fail to meet the serious needs of the poor and the little ones who are his brethren.” CCC1033
In Economic matters, respect for the human dignity requires the practice of the virtue of temperance, so as to moderate attachment to this world’s goods, the practice of the virtue of justice, to preserve our neighbours rights and render him what is his due: the practice of solidarity, in accordance with the golden rule. CCC 2407
“Love for the poor is even one of the motives for the duty of working so as to be able to give to those in need.” CCC 2444
“The disordered desire for money cannot but produce perverse effects.” CCC 2424
“Goods, even when legitimately owned, always have a universal destination; any type of improper accumulation is immoral, because it openly contradicts the universal destination assigned to all goods by the Creator.” Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church
A disconcerting conclusion about the most recent period should serve to enlighten us: side-by-side with the miseries of underdevelopment, themselves unacceptable, we find ourselves up against a form of super-development, equally inadmissible. because like the former it is contrary to what is good and to true happiness. This super-development, which consists in an excessive availability of every kind of material goods for the benefit of certain social groups, easily makes people slaves of "possession" and of immediate gratification, with no other horizon than the multiplication or continual replacement of the things already owned with others still better. This is the so-called civilization of "consumption" or "consumerism," which involves so much "throwing-away" and "waste." An object already owned but now superseded by something better is discarded, with no thought of its possible lasting value in itself, nor of some other human being who is poorer.- John Paul II - Sollicitudo Rei Socialis
“A way has to be found to enable everyone to benefit from the fruits of the earth, and not simply to close the gap between the affluent and those who must be satisfied with the crumbs falling from the table, but above all to satisfy the demands of justice, fairness and respect for every human being.”- Pope Francis
“A Christian who is too attached to riches has lost his way.” - Pope Francis
“The times talk to us of so much poverty in the world and this is a scandal. Poverty in the world is a scandal. In a world where there is so much wealth, so many resources to feed everyone, it is unfathomable that there are so many hungry children, that there are so many children without an education, so many poor persons. Poverty today is a cry.” Pope Francis
"Money must serve, not rule! The Pope loves everyone, rich and poor alike, but he is obliged in the name of Christ to remind all that the rich must help, respect and promote the poor. I exhort you to generous solidarity and a return of economics and finance to an ethical approach which favours human beings." Pope Francis, Evangelii Gaudium
“Today, the scientific community realizes what the poor have long told us: harm, perhaps irreversible harm, is being done to the ecosystem. The earth, entire peoples and individual persons are being brutally punished. And behind all this pain, death and destruction there is the stench of what Basil of Caesarea called “the dung of the devil”. An unfettered pursuit of money rules. The service of the common good is left behind. Once capital becomes an idol and guides people’s decisions, once greed for money presides over the entire socioeconomic system, it ruins society, it condemns and enslaves men and women, it destroys human fraternity, it sets people against one another and, as we clearly see, it even puts at risk our common home.” - Pope Francis
“Consumerism has accustomed us to waste. But throwing food away is like stealing it from the poor and hungry.” - Pope Francis
“The rich man is only an administrator of what he possesses; giving what is required to the needy is a task that is to be performed with humility because the goods do not belong to the one who distributes them. He who retains riches for himself is not innocent; giving to those in need means paying a debt.”- St Gregory the Great.
“Practicing charity is the best way to evangelize.” -Pope Francis
"The culture of prosperity deadens us; we are thrilled if the market offers us something new to purchase; and in the meantime all those lives stunted for lack of opportunity seem a mere spectacle; they fail to move us. Almost without being aware of it, we end up being incapable of feeling compassion at the outcry of the poor, weeping for other people's pain, and feeling a need to help them, as though all this were someone else's responsibility and not our own." - Pope Francis, Evangelii Gaudium
Hence it must needs be that man's good in their respect consists in a certain measure, in other words, that man seeks, according to a certain measure, to have external riches, in so far as they are necessary for him to live in keeping with his condition of life. Wherefore it will be a sin for him to exceed this measure, by wishing to acquire or keep them immoderately. This is what is meant by covetousness, which is defined as "immoderate love of possessing." It is therefore evident that covetousness is a sin. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica
Those who bestow laudatory addresses on the rich appear to me to be rightly judged not only flatterers and base, in vehemently pretending that things which are disagreeable give them pleasure, but also godless and treacherous; godless, because neglecting to praise and glorify God, who is alone perfect and good, of whom are all things, and by whom are all things, and for whom are all things, (Romans 11:36) they invest with divine honours men wallowing in an execrable and abominable life, and, what is the principal thing, liable on this account to the judgment of God; and treacherous, because, although wealth is of itself sufficient to puff up and corrupt the souls of its possessors, and to turn them from the path by which salvation is to be attained, they stupefy them still more, by inflating the minds of the rich with the pleasures of extravagant praises, and by making them utterly despise all things except wealth, on account of which they are admired; bringing, as the saying is, fire to fire, pouring pride on pride, and adding conceit to wealth, a heavier burden to that which by nature is a weight, from which somewhat ought rather to be removed and taken away as being a dangerous and deadly disease.- Clement of Alexandria
“Abandonment to the providence of the Father in heaven frees us from anxiety about tomorrow. Trust in God is a preparation for the blessedness of the poor. They shall see God.” CCC 2547
Don't forget it: he has most who needs least. Don't create needs for yourself.
Detach yourself from the goods of the world. Love and practise poverty of spirit: be content with what enables you to live a simple and sober life. Otherwise, you will never be an apostle.
Rather than in not having, true poverty consists in being detached, in voluntarily renouncing one's dominion over things.
That is why there are poor who are really rich. And vice-versa.
If you are a man of God, you will seek to despise riches as intensely as men of the world seek to possess them.
What attachment to the things of the earth! Soon they will slip from your grasp, for the rich man cannot take his riches with him to the grave.
You haven't got the spirit of poverty if, when you are able to choose in such a way that your choice is not noticed, you do not select for yourself what is worst.
'Divitiae, si affluant, nolite cor apponere, though riches may increase keep your heart detached.' Strive to use them generously. And, if necessary, heroically.
Be poor of spirit.
Josemaria Escriva- The Way, 630-631
…we are not discussing the mere lack of things; this lack will not divest the soul if it craves for all these objects. We are dealing with the denudation of the soul’s appetites and gratifications. This is what leaves it free and empty of all things, even though it possesses them. —St. John of the Cross, Ascent of Mount Carmel, Book I, Ch. 3, p. 123
Prosperity knits a man to the world. He feels that he is finding his place in it, while really it is finding its place in him.
C.S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters
It is sad to see what some people understand by almsgiving: a few pennies or some old clothes. They seem not to have read the Gospel.
Don’t be over-cautious: help people to acquire sufficient faith and fortitude to be ready to deny themselves generously, in this life, what they need
Josemaria Escriva- The Furrow (26)
Nowadays it is not enough for men and women to be good. Moreover, it is not good enough to be satisfied with being nearly… good. It is necessary to be ‘revolutionary’. Faced by hedonism, faced by the pagan and materialistic wares that we are being offered, Christ wants objectors! — rebels of Love!
Josemaria Escriva- The Furrow (128)
Therefore, those whom fortune favours are warned that riches do not bring freedom from sorrow and are of no avail for eternal happiness, but rather are obstacles; that the rich should tremble at the threatening of Jesus Christ- threatenings so unwonted in the mouth of our Lord- and that a most strict account must be given to the Supreme Judge for all we possess. Pope Leo XIII, Encyclical Rerum Novarum, 1891
Man should not consider his material possession his own, but as common to all, so as to share them without hesitation when others are in need. - Thomas Aquinas
Whence the apostle says “Command the rich of this world… to offer with no stint, to apportion largely.” True, no one is commanded to distribute to others that which is required for his own needs and those of his household… It is a duty, not of justice (save in extreme cases), but of Christian charity- a duty not enforced by human law.
Pope Leo XIII, Rerum Novarum
For this reason, wealth is dangerous and – says Jesus – even makes one’s salvation difficult. - Pope Francis, Canonization of Oscar Romero Oct 14 2018
My God, I see I shall never accept you as my Saviour unless I acknowledge you as my Model at the same time. —Since you yourself chose to be poor, make me love holy poverty. I resolve, with your grace, to live and die in poverty, even though I may have millions at my disposal.
Jose Maria Escriva, the Forge (46)
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