Read ‘Dilexi Te’
To the editor:
Pope Leo recently released his first Apostolic Exhortation: “Dilexi Te:, To All Christians On Love For the Poor.” I have read it and I would encourage all Catholics to also read it. It can be Google searched. Yes, it’s long, but take it in chunks! Through references from the Old Testament which Jesus quotes in the two great commandments (Mt. 22: 36-40), to Christ’s admonition in Matthew Chapter 25, to statements by Church fathers and popes over the centuries, Leo maps out the direct obligation we have to love the poor. Quoting the apostle John we are told: “Those who do not love a brother or sister whom they have seen, cannot love God whom they have not seen.”
This beautifully written document challenges us all to reframe the basis of our faith and what is called for today. How can we bring about the Kingdom of God that we pray for in the Our Father in the midst of the inequality and suffering surrounding us? How do we justify Christianity when it espouses racism or contempt for those of other faiths, or violence as an appropriate strategy?
Leo warns against “any church community if it thinks it can comfortably go its own way without creative concern and effective cooperation in helping the poor to live with dignity…” Thank you, Pope Leo, for calling us to the better angels of our nature and the true foundation of the faith we follow in Jesus! A timely voice indeed.
Mary Lu Callahan
Iowa City
