The tenor of our lives becomes one of humble and joyful thanksgiving.
Awareness of our poverty and ineptitude causes us to rejoice in the gift of being called out of darkness into wondrous light and translated into the kingdom of God's beloved Son.
In conversation, the disciple who is truly poor in spirit always leaves the other person feeling, My life has been enriched by talking with you.
This is neither false modesty nor phony humility.
His or her life has been enriched and graced.
He is not all exhaust and no intake. She does not impose herself on others.
He listens well because he knows he has so much to learn from others. Her spiritual poverty enables her to enter the world of the other, even when she cannot identify with that world -- e.g., the drug culture, the gay world.
The poor in spirit are the most nonjudgmental of peoples; they get along well with sinners.
-- From The Ragamuffin Gospel, Chapter 4,
by Brennan Manning
Blessed are the poor in spirit,
for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
Matthew 5:3
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