Margaret Anna Fridays ... on the Vows

Most Fridays, I’m going to share a quote from the founder of my groovy sisters, Margaret Anna Cusack, known in religion as Mother Francis Clare. In the weeks leading up to my profession of final vows on November 11th, I will be highlighting some of her insights on the vows.  Here's today's installment:

Now there is one consideration in regard to the vow of poverty of which we should do well to take very special note both for our own sanctification and for the good of others.  It is this--there is no doubt that though we have made a vow of poverty, there are thousands of our fellow creatures whose actual poverty is beyond all comparison greater than ours.  Even in the most austere orders in the Church, even where the vow of poverty is observed most strictly in every detail--in appearance as well as in fact--there is no such poverty as the poverty of the poor.