Jesus says he has come to preach the Gospel to the poor since, in fact, they’re the only ones who can hear it! They don’t have to prove or protect anything.

We always have to ask: In what sense are we ourselves rich? What do we have to defend? What principles do we have to prove? What keeps us from being open and poor?

The issue isn’t primarily material goods, but our spiritual and intellectual goods….my ego, my reputation, my self-image, my need to be right, my need to be successful, my need to have everything under my control, my need to be loved….

The words of the Gospel never let us live in self-satisfaction.  Rather they always make us empty. They always make us repeat the truth of Mary’s “Let it be done unto me according to your word.”  They allow us to keep our wounds open so we can receive Christ in us. 

It seems we are quite incapable of welcoming Christ, because we are so stuffed full of ourselves.  The real thing we have to let go of is our self.

Fr. Richard Rohr “Simplicity: The Art of Living”