World Youth Day USA Guides Retreat Manual | Page 56
their eyes and listen to them. The poor provide
various diocesan social justice
us with a concrete opportunity to encounter
organizations; work camps and mission
Christ himself, and to touch his suffering flesh.
networks; religious orders (with their
However… the poor are not just people to
respective vows of poverty); ecumenical
whom we can give something. They have much
and interfaith alliances, among others.
to offer us and to teach us. How much we have to
learn from the wisdom of the poor! …In a very
Seven themes of Catholic social teaching, as
real way, the poor are our teachers. They show
articulated through a tradition of papal,
us that people’s value is not measured by their
conciliar, and episcopal documents:
possessions or how much money they have in
1. the life and dignity of the
human person;
the bank. A poor person, a person lacking
2. the call to family, community,
material possessions, always maintains