… many prophets and kings wanted to hear what you hear, and never heard it

(Luke 10:24)

It is often the little ones of this world who hear the music of life ‘rather than the learned and the clever', as today's gospel says. It is common knowledge, for instance, that children can have an extraordinary insight into things - when they are not driving us crazy - as any teacher in a primary school will tell you. As Isaiah puts it: The infant plays over the cobra's hole; into the viper's lair the young child puts his hand.

So, too, those on the margins of life have an access to wisdom and the unheard music of life denied the rest of us, as we go about our respectable lives. The most attentive congregation I ever had was when I was a prison chaplain and said a weekly Mass in front of about one hundred guests of Her Majesty. You could hear a pin drop as the gospel was being read. I had a similar experience recently when I said Mass for a group of homeless people living in a hostel.

The ‘option for the poor' is not about giving hand-outs to them, then going away and feeling good about it. Rather, it is about acknowledging that the poor have something to give us, surprising though that may seem. The poor, the marginalized, the sick, those at the edge, children even, manifest the power that comes from weakness. A power that speaks of the joy of being open to God's love - in spite of everything.

Christ gave his disciples the power to see what others can't see. That's why they were so successful in their ministry. As Christ is no longer with us in the flesh, where do we turn to now for the same inspiration?  To the ‘little ones' of life. Christ is speaking to us through them.

***

A meditation written by Fr Paul Graham O.S.A., Assistant General on the Augustinian Council for Northern Europe, including the Provinces of Ireland, England & Scotland, Poland, Germany, Austria and Slovakia

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