Poverty strips people of choice. That's the cold, brutal fact at the heart of the decision-making those who do have choice often disdain. Most of us have never had to choose between food or medicine, a bed or a roof, or make the heart-wrenching decision to send a child to work in the fields instead of to school.

Those who sit in judgment of the poor ("it's their own fault") forget that free will and free choice go hand-in-hand. It's easy to make moral dictates from afar. It's much harder to actually be with those who struggle and live in their reality.

Is it any wonder Pope Francis keeps calling for a poor Church for the poor? Can there really be any other path if the Church is to survive?