Homily – 26th Sunday – Year C – Fr Jeremiah Browne (National Director the Pontifical Mission Societies #Botswana #Swaziland #southafrica #eswatini
Yesterday, the 27th of September, we celebrated the feast of Saint Vincent de Paul, a man whose life and legacy shine a powerful light on the meaning of today’s Gospel.
Vincent lived in 16th century France, at a time of enormous inequality between the rich and the poor. He saw beggars on the streets, orphans abandoned at church doors, and people crushed under the weight of hunger and disease. He realized that poverty is not only material; it wounds the human spirit, leaving people feeling forgotten and worthless.
What was special about Vincent was the fact that he wasn’t content to feel pity and then move on. He believed the poor were his “lords and masters.” He organized groups of women, called Charities, who gave their time, food, and clothing to those in need. Some of these women chose the consecrated life and became the first female congregation to live a consecrated life “in the world,” and not in the cloister in a congregation that became known as the “Daughters of Charity.” This was radical for its time, a living witness that love is practical, concrete, and costly.
Two centuries later, Vincent’s witness inspired a young college student in Paris, Frederick Ozanam. At only 20 years of age, he and a few friends could not close their eyes to the poverty around them. They founded what we now know as the Society of Saint Vincent de Paul. Their mission was not only to bring bread, but friendship – to recognize the humanity and dignity of the poor.
That brings us directly to the Gospel today. (Lk 16:19-31). Jesus tells us of the rich man dressed in fine clothes who feasted every day, while at his very gate lay Lazarus, starving and covered in sores. The sin of the rich man was not his wealth. His sin was his blindness – his refusal to notice the one at his door. He walked past Lazarus day after day and did nothing.
It is easy to shake our heads at the rich man, but the Gospel challenges us to look at our own lives. Who is the Lazarus at our door? Poverty today may not always look like a beggar with sores. It may be the lonely neighbour who never gets a visitor. It may be the refugee family struggling to build a new life in a strange country. It may be the young person trapped in addiction, or the elderly person forgotten in a nursing home. Poverty wears many faces. The question is: do we see them, and do we respond?
Saint Vincent insisted that service to the poor is service to Christ himself. He once said, “When you leave prayer and Holy Mass to serve the poor, you are losing nothing, because serving the poor is going to God and you should see God in them.”
That is the very heart of our Christian mission: encounter. Encounter with Christ in Word and Sacrament must lead us to encounter him in the hungry, the sick, and the stranger. Otherwise, our faith risks becoming an empty shell.
There is also a grace in this. When we open our hearts to the poor, something changes within us. We begin to see the world differently. Our priorities shift. Our hearts soften. We become more human, more Christ-like. Vincent and Ozanam did not simply change the lives of the poor; they themselves were transformed by the friendship and faith of those they served.
So today, as we listen to the story of the rich man and Lazarus, let us not hear it as something distant or abstract. It is not just about a man in purple robes long ago. It is about us, here and now. It asks us: Who is the Lazarus at my gate? Who is the person I are tempted to walk past, to ignore, to forget?
May Saint Vincent de Paul, and all those who have walked in his footsteps, teach us not to turn away. May we bring not only bread but friendship, not only charity but love. May our encounter with Christ at this altar today give us eyes to see him in those who wait at our door.
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Please consider praying a decade of the rosary on a daily basis for the evangelising Mission of the Church and the Pope’s intentions.
The Pope’s prayer intention for September: ‘For our relationship with all of creation’
Let us pray that, inspired by Saint Francis, we might experience our interdependence with all creatures who are loved by God and worthy of love and respect.
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Blessed Pauline Jaricot, Pray for us. 🙏🏼🙏🏼
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