One of our priests told me a story of visiting an elderly woman at her house in Mexico. As he was leaving she pressed a peso into his hand. “This is for the poor, Padre.” He looked at her house — a wattle frame, thatched roof, dirt floor, cooking over an open fire. “Who are the poor, Dona Maria?” he asked. “The poor are those who do not know God,” she answered. It is so easy for us to become obsessed with our own problems and difficulties. Dona Maria’s peso, and the widow’s mite in the gospel story — this poor widow put in more than all the rest — remind us that we always need to have room in our hearts to recognize the needs of others.
