“Like every human organization the Church is constantly in danger of corruption. As soon as power and wealth come to the Church, manipulation, exploitation, misuse of influence, and outright corruption are not far away. How do we prevent corruption in the Church? The answer is clear: by focusing on the poor. The poor make the Church faithful to its vocation. When the Church is no longer a church for the poor, it loses its spiritual identity. It gets caught up in disagreements, jealousy, power games, and pettiness…The poor are given to the Church so that the Church as the body of Christ can be and remain a place of mutual concern, love, and peace.”
Henri Nouwen in Bread for the Journey reading for October 31 (New York: HarperCollins, 1997).