Just before noon today I was on the sidewalk at Marquette University passing out flyers about our rally to end militarism on campus on Sept. 24th, the 46th anniversary of the Milwaukee 14 burning selective service files. I wore an Army hat I had picked up at Goodwill plus my homemade T Shirt to close down ROTC on campus.

As usual many students just ignore you or say thank you as they walk by and do not take the flyer. A few take the flyer, out of curiosity or interest. They do not know what the Milwaukee 14 was and they are trained to show no interest in MU teaching war and killing. But most just refuse any flyer no matter what.

I was by myself when a large group of students were leaving one of the halls. A young adult African American male approached me and said he was homeless and could I help him out with money for food. I said sure I could but he would have to wait a few minutes since the students were descending on us and I needed to get out these flyers. He said he would help distribute the flyers and he did, although he did not know what they were about. I was going to go to Mass at Gesu next door at noon but said to the young man that I would take him out for lunch. He became honest with me and said he really wanted the money to help his girlfriend who was sick and staying at his ‘pad’. So I gave some money, he thanked me, was on his way, and I went in the Church.

You never know if beggars are being honest with you or not but my policy is, if I can, to help them out in some way without judgment. In this case I felt the person, the second time asking, was being honest. St. Ignatius of Loyola, the founder of the Society of Jesus, Jesuits who started Marquette University, was a beggar when he first turned his life around and decided to follow the way of Jesus. In fact, many great persons, St. Francis and even Jesus did some time begging.

A scripture scholar wrote how a translation of “Blessed are the poor” basically meant in Jesus’ time blessed is the blind beggar. Families at Jesus’ time took care of their own but there were some persons, like widows and blind beggar that were very dependent on community and needed to beg to live. Physically, materially or spiritually we are all dependent on others. Begging is for the dependent, the blessed of God.

Comments

Please send any comments on this post to . Let us know which day’s post your comments pertain to. If the comments are appropriate we will post them here for you.