Together with Advent, the Christmas season is a time of year arrayed in generosity: Gifts are placed under Christmas trees, carols are sung, food and drink are enjoyed.
The acts of hospitality and kindness that are hallmarks of this time are a stark contrast with the dark shroud of poverty that covers many parts of our cities and world. Homelessness, crime, addiction, hunger, disease, and violence compete with the hope and generosity of this season of peace.
I am reminded of the story of St. Martin of Tours, patron of France, of soldiers and tailors. It is not exactly a Christmas tale, but it might teach us about the spirit that pervades the season.
Martin was a fourth-century monk and bishop. Although he was a great leader in the Church in his later years, Martin is probably most well-known for an event of his youth.
I still remember how one of my teachers in elementary school told the story: Martin was a young Roman cavalry officer when he encountered a beggar who was freezing in the winter cold. Moved at the plight of the beggar, Martin cut his own cloak with his sword and gave half to the beggar. That night, Martin had a dream of Jesus wearing the half-cloak that he had given away. Our teacher described it as a lesson in generosity.
It is a nice story, but something about it always bothered me. The bestowal of half a cloak on a freezing beggar just does not seem to be very generous. I suppose it is better than nothing, but Martin was a soldier and would most likely have had easy access to new cloaks. The beggar did not. Why not just give the beggar the cloak and get another one later? Martin would have probably spent one night in the cold. Instead, with only half a cloak each, both soldier and beggar would have spent the night half-cold.
Perhaps that is the real point of the story. It is not a lesson in generosity at all, but rather a lesson in solidarity.
The cloak of Martin is a symbol of the Church’s teaching on care for the poor, not only at Christmas time, but every day. It also gives a concrete model on how we put into action those same teachings. Social justice is not to be understood as a benevolent handout from above, but an encounter between equals, an act of solidarity.
Sacred Scripture repeatedly associates justice with the poor. They are either its recipients, those who are granted justice, or they are the just, themselves, who are praised in their poverty.
The Psalms describe them as the ones whose cries are heard by God (Psalm 34). The Gospel story identifies the poor widow as the one who will receive justice from a judge who is, himself, unjust. (Luke 18). The prophet Isaiah asserts that God will “judge the poor with justice and decide aright for the land’s afflicted.” (Isaiah 11) The poor, those who mourn and the persecuted are lauded as the just ones who receive the rewards that belong to those who are right with God (Matthew 5). Their souls are “in the hand of God” as is described in the Book of Wisdom (Wisdom 3). Jesus’ explanation in Mark’s Gospel of the widow’s mite (Mark 12) defines her as one of the just.
God’s merciful justice is gifted to the poor, the outcast, the lost and the foreigner, even the sinner. God continually reveals himself as taking the side of those in need. Adam and Eve, after losing Paradise, are given clothing to cover their shame and children to replace what they lost. Abraham and Sarah are barren pilgrims who receive the promise of becoming a great nation. Moses is a condemned infant fished out of the Nile to become the great leader of the Exodus. David is the youngest son of Jesse but is anointed to rule over the tribes of Israel. Perhaps God’s choice of the Israelites — not the powerful Egyptians, Babylonians, or Romans — as his special people is itself an example of justice to the poor.
But why does God associate himself over and over again with the poor and outcast?
Like most questions about God, this one is answered by the Incarnation. St. Paul in Philippians 2:6 declares that Jesus, “though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God something to be grasped. Rather, he emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, coming in human likeness.” God prefers the poor, the outcast and marginalized because they are most like him, although God’s impoverishment is a free choice made from love for us, his children.
The sacrifice of the cross of Christ is evidence enough of how God embraces poverty. The author of life in this sacrificial act pours out his own life for others. St. Francis of Assisi embraced the poverty of the cross. He did this not because poverty is good, but because he accepted the cross to be the ultimate impoverishment of God, who had become one with his creation in the person of Jesus.
St. Gregory Nazianzen, another fourth-century bishop, explained what this impoverishment of God in the marvel of the incarnation meant when he wrote that, “He who makes rich is made poor; he takes on the poverty of my flesh, that I may gain the riches of his divinity.”
God’s generous love is so great that he pours himself out, like wine; he breaks himself and shares, like bread. It is no accident that two of the prominent miracles of Jesus result in an over-abundance of wine and of bread. These signs of generosity foreshadow the sacramental gifting of his body and blood in the Eucharist; bread, simple food for the poor, and wine, the drink of celebration.
The Church models herself after this same kind of humility.
In his Apostolic Exhortation “Dilexi Te,” (“I Have Loved You”), Pope Leo XIV outlines what a “poor Church that is for the poor” looks like. Like Francis, she embraces poverty because it most clearly models the merciful, humble action of God in salvation history. “When the Church bends down to care for the poor, she assumes her highest posture,” Leo writes.
The Holy Father describes ministries of the Church that serve the poor, like the pastoral care for the sick, in which the Church touches the suffering of Christ. He speaks of the liberation of prisoners as an extension of Christ’s redemptive sacrifice through restorative justice. He describes the work of the Church in education in the terms used by St. Joseph Calasanz, who calls education of the poor the “highest expression of Christian charity.”
Pope Leo also speaks in a very poignant way about the Church’s solidarity with migrants and refugees.
Migration is the foundation of the entire history of salvation. Abraham set out at the call of God, as did Moses. The Holy Family sought refuge and shelter as refugees in Egypt, and the apostles’ great commission is to “go and make disciples of all nations.” The people of God are described as a pilgrim people, a Church that goes out to the margins as missionary disciples. By embracing the poor, the Church acts “like a mother who accompanies those who are walking.”
The world might see immigrants and refugees as threats, but the Church sees them as God’s children first. The dignity that they possess is not defined by their nation of origin or race or culture, but is a gift from God himself.
There is no argument against the right and responsibility of a nation to maintain and protect the integrity of its borders, to keep its citizens safe and prosperous. But the integrity of borders cannot be maintained at the cost of our common human dignity. The disrespect of one is the disrespect of all.
One can only guess what our world would be like if Abraham had been repatriated to Ur, if Moses and the Israelites had been turned away from the Holy Land, if the Holy Family had not received refuge in Egypt, or if the apostles had not gone out to teach nations. If our knowledge of history has taught us anything, it is that people are meant to be pilgrims, walking together to the kingdom of God. There are no foreigners in heaven.
Here, we return to the cloak of Martin. Martin’s action of solidarity with the poor, a simple gesture of humility, represents the whole of our Catholic social teaching. A “poor church that is for the poor” embraces this pouring out of self in a communion of equals.
Our brothers and sisters are suffering in faraway places like Ukraine, Gaza, and Sudan, but they are also found on the streets of Los Angeles, in immigrant detention centers, and in our neighborhoods and homes. They are all family to us. Like family, we join them in their joys and their sufferings.
In this season when we celebrate God’s act of solidarity with us, his children, we are challenged to follow his example. It’s an example given to us beautifully by Martin, too. So, this Christmas and anytime when you encounter the poor, the outcast, the abused, the refugee, the sick, the sinner … share your cloak.
