The Poor Woman

  Donatello's Mary Magdalene in Florence, Italy

Like most people, I assume like most people, I struggle over whether to give money to those holding up signs saying they need food, shelter, or just money. There is a certain corner on La Cienega and San Vicente here in Los Angeles, where there appear to be shifts of individuals with signs. There is the man who says he is a veteran; there is the woman who puts her hands together as if in prayer; there is the young man about whom it is hard not to say to yourself, "Why can't he find some job?" for he looks fairly healthy and sturdy. I give a dollar here and there. I have given cards for help finding jobs and a place to live to some along with a dollar or two. But they are there almost every day. There was a recent article, and not the first I have seen, where someone who claimed to be in need packed up his things from a median or a side of the road and went back to his not ramshackle residence. These sorts of reports tend to harden one's heart, and these days, with so much skulduggery around in small and great places, it is difficult not to have one's heart get hard as a rock.

I have told myself, "Just give. It doesn't matter what they do with the money. That's between them and their consciences. You are doing what you believe you ought." But then I would be giving a dollar block to block because some days, that's what happens, it is one person after another at every store, every gas station, every eatery. I have bought food for some. Some have said no to the food and insisted on money. There goes my heart again, solidifying.

Today was a variation and my heart, well, it softened so that I was nearly weeping.

It was after the noon Mass at St. Victor. I was putting out the candles and cleaning up the vessels. My final act was to close the gates to the sanctuary, when a woman came to the altar rail. I couldn't believe how much she reminded me of the picture that heads this entry. She was about as thin. She wasn't wearing dress like rags--she was dressed in pants and a shirt and sweater over it. Her blondish hair, or maybe it was gray, was long and straggly, pretty much exactly like the picture. She kind of lisped, so I assumed she was missing some teeth, and her accent sounded vaguely Middle Western, maybe Oklahoma. She called to me. "Ma'am".  When I saw her, I assumed she would be asking for some money. Her face was so gaunt. But she asked only if there was a Bible in the Church she could read. There are books in the sacristy for prayers for various occasions, some formal books with readings for the day, but it isn't a religious library and it was unlikely there would be a Bible as such. Besides I couldn't give away a hard cover belonging to the parish even if I found one. I told her that I probably didn't have a Bible, but I'd look for something that I could let her look at (and if it came to that keep). She went to the very back row.

We usually have a softcover Magnificat, or the Daily Word lying about. These include readings for the day and meditations, and I find them really on point and deeply comforting. The one that I found was probably supposed to stay in the sacristy, but no one had written on it, "Do not remove" as so often they do. I made an executive spiritual decision. I went to the back and gave it to her. She was looking at the Missalette, but this would be much more substantial. She took it, I'd almost say, greedily, but in a good way. Then she asked me how far we were from the ocean. I said "quite a way but you can take the bus."  She said she didn't have money for the bus. But then she also didn't ask me for any. She said that she had been walking, needed a rest, but would walk to the ocean. "That's going to be a long walk." She said, "I just need to rest a little bit."

Something about her made me think of Jesus. She seemed out of time to me, and I could easily imagine her encountering Him, and He blessing her.

I ran into a few people on the way to my car, where I had a twenty and about five or six in singles--I was low on cash and needed an ATM run. I hoped she'd still be there. She was. And she was reading the Magnificat. I offered her the singles so she could get the bus to the ocean. She said, "No, I don't use money." She didn't say she doesn't take money. She said, "I walk."  "But how do you eat?" I pursued.

"I go through garbage cans. Sometimes people will buy me food. Sometimes I go to the food pantries."  I said, "Well, if we were at a restaurant, I would buy you some food, so just take the money."  She declined, quietly, but firmly.

Was her declination a part of her psychological fragility? Was it something more deep and philosophical?  I will probably never know.

But she seemed to me to be precisely what the Lord called the "poor in spirit."  Almost penitential like Mary Magdalene. I remember sitting across from the statue many many years ago, on my first trip to Europe. I was drawn to her. Today, I felt just about as drawn to the poor woman who visited St. Victor's.