Blessed are the poor in spirit: Zeph 3; 1 Cor 1 and the Beatitudes of Mt 5.

Beati pauperes spiritu: quoniam ipsorum est regnum caelorum.
Mt 5:3

The Fourth Sunday in Ordinary Time of Year A brings together three texts around the beatitude of the poor and the humble as the privileged recipients of the Kingdom. Zeph 2:3; 3:12-13 urges the search for humility and announces the humble and poor people whom God will reserve for Himself. 1 Cor 1:26-31 proclaims that God chose what is weak, foolish and despised in order to confound the wise and the powerful, so that no one may boast before God. Mt 5:1-12a proclaims the Beatitudes: the poor in spirit, the meek, the merciful, the pure of heart, the peacemakers, those persecuted for the sake of justice, these are the blessed of the Kingdom. The three texts describe the inverted logic of God: the first are the last, the despised are the chosen, the poor inherit the Kingdom.

I. The First Reading: Zeph 2:3; 3:12-13

Zephaniah invites the humble of the earth to seek the Lord: “Seek the Lord, all you humble of the earth, who have kept His precepts. Seek justice, seek humility” (Zeph 2:3). And he announces what God will reserve after the judgment: “In your midst I will leave a humble and poor people, and they will trust in the name of the Lord” (Zeph 3:12). The remnant of Israel will not be the rich, the powerful, the diplomatically skilled: it will be the people who trust in the name of the Lord, who have committed no injustice, who have uttered no lies, who have no deceitful tongue (v.13). Zephaniah anticipates the Beatitudes: the people who inherit the promise are not defined by power or by knowledge, but by the relationship of trust and fidelity to God. The Hebrew term “anawim,” the poor, the humble, those who depend on God, describes exactly the ones whom Zephaniah announces as the recipients of the promise.

II. The Second Reading: 1 Cor 1:26-31

Paul invites the Corinthians to look at their own social composition: “Consider, brothers, your own calling: there are not many wise among you according to the flesh, nor many powerful, nor many of noble birth” (1 Cor 1:26). And the divine principle: “But God chose what is foolish in the world to confound the wise. God chose what is weak in the world to confound what is strong. God chose what is low and despised in the world, what is nothing, in order to reduce to nothing what is” (vv.27-28). The reason: “So that no creature may boast before God” (v.29). The only legitimate glory is that of the one who boasts in the Lord (v.31, citing Jer 9:22-23). Paul articulates the paradox of the Beatitudes in sociological language: the Christian community is the incarnation of the logic of the Beatitudes, where those without power are the chosen and the powerful are the confounded.

III. Evangelium: Mt 5:1-12a

Jesus goes up the mountain, in Matthew the mountain is the place of the new Law, and proclaims the Beatitudes. “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven” (Mt 5:3). “Blessed are the meek, for they shall possess the earth” (v.5). “Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy” (v.7). “Blessed are the pure of heart, for they shall see God” (v.8). “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called children of God” (v.9). “Blessed are those persecuted for the sake of justice, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven” (v.10). And the personal beatitude, addressed to the disciples: “Blessed shall you be when they insult you and persecute you and utter every evil against you, on account of Me” (v.11). The Beatitudes are not a list of virtues to be practiced: they are the description of the life of those who, because they stand on God’s side, end up on the wrong side of human power. They are the self-portrait of Jesus and the program of the disciple.

IV. Mary and the Beatitudes

Theological tradition has recognized in Mary the most perfect icon of the Beatitudes. Poor in spirit: the Magnificat begins with the acknowledgment of her own lowliness, “He has looked upon the lowliness of His handmaid” (Lk 1:48). The Greek term “tapeinosis” is exactly the one Zephaniah uses for the people whom God reserves for Himself. Mary is, individually, the “humble and poor people” of Zeph 3:12: the one who trusts in the name of the Lord, who has no injustice on her lips. 1 Cor 1 says that God chose what is nothing in order to reduce to nothing what is: Mary, a young woman of Nazareth with neither name nor position, was chosen to be the Mother of the Son of God, the greatest act of inversion of human logic that the Bible records. Meekness: the whole life of Mary in Nazareth is the fulfillment of “blessed are the meek.” Mercy: the intercession at Cana, the presence at the foot of the Cross, the spiritual motherhood of the Church, are the acts of the merciful one par excellence. Pure of heart: the Immaculate Conception is the highest degree of purity of heart, the total transparency to God that has no shadow of sin. Peacemaker: Mary in the Upper Room with the apostles (Acts 1:14) is the figure of the peace that unites the divided community. The Beatitudes are the program of Jesus. Mary lived them before she heard them.