Almsgiving | Christmas Season | rosary | Feast of St. Stephen
If you are someone who lends your favorite books to family members or friends only to find that the loan has become permanent, or sends thank you notes and birthday cards only to realize with a heart that sits somewhere between resignation and a slight ache that not everyone remembers your birthday or sends you messages of thanks, then the Church’s teaching on almsgiving and charity will be a source of much consolation—for in essence it is that only what is given away will be ours to keep.
St Augustine places this teaching in the mouth of Christ as Augustine speaks of this to his congregation: “…on earth, my members were suffering, my members were in need. If you gave anything to my members, what you gave would reach their Head….I placed them on earth for you and appointed them your stewards to bring your good works into my treasury.” Then Christ laments to those who have not given to the poor and suffering, “But you have placed nothing in their hands; therefore you have found nothing in my presence” (Sermon 18, 4.).
Receive the King
The Rosary is a beautiful reminder of this fundamental truth. It is the story of the poor maiden who receives her King in secret, and then gave all she had to follow him faithfully to his death and is at the last crowned Queen of a rejoicing heaven and earth. The simple, slow movement of the beads through our fingers lead us, step by step, bead by bead, into an ever-deepening meditation of this journey.
The English poet, John Clare, wrote a memorable poem, “An Invite, to Eternity,” which we can take here as an evocative calling upon Our Lady to assist us on this journey to heaven through the rosary, learning the way, under her patient teaching, of giving freely and generously for the sake of an eternal keeping:
“Wilt thou go with me, sweet maid,
Say maiden, wilt thou go with me
Through the valley-depths of shade,
Of night and dark obscurity…
Say maiden; wilt thou go with me
In this strange death of life to be…?”
Rosary Reminders
The Rosary is the constant reminder of the sweet maiden, Mary’s, faithful accompaniment of us as we make this journey in the small deaths of charity and alms-giving, knowing that at each step, we can be glad of the treasure being stored up for us, in the golden halls of heaven.
“Then trace thy footsteps on with me;
We’re wed to one eternity.”
I am looking through my bookshelves for the books I want to read for all eternity and wondering who to give them to.
Petroc Willey, STL, PhD, is married to Katherine and has four children and eight grandchildren. Originally from England, he has lived in Steubenville, Ohio, since 2015 where he is now a Professor of Theology and Catechetics. Before this move to the United States, from 1985, Petroc taught in Catholic education, in Oxford and Birmingham, in both seminary and lay institutions, and in both traditional and distance education. He was appointed by Pope Benedict XVI a Consultor for the Pontifical Council for the Promotion of the New Evangelization and is currently a Consultor to the Dicastery for Evangelization in the Section for Fundamental Questions regarding Evangelization in the World.