"The beatitudes are words of promise...a criterion for the discernment of spirits...directions for finding the right path." This is what Pope Benedict XVI says about the beatitudes in his book Jesus of Nazareth. And he goes on at length to examine each individual beatitude as presented in the Gospels according to Matthew and Luke. The Pope observes that Jesus, as reported in Luke's gospel, might have used the beatitudes to describe the actual conditions of those who used to gather to listen to him. He looked at them and saw them to be actually poor, meek, and persecuted. Jesus looked at the crowds and saw a people who needed words of encouragement and to be consoled. The poor, the sick, the hungry, the lame, and aliens were being persecuted by the mere fact of their status as 'non-persons' and as such were pushed to the margins of the society where they lived at the mercy of those who had status. And despite the fact that they had no one to fight or speak for them, Jesus saw them as blessed. Why? The Hebrew Scriptures always portray the poor and unfortunate as God's favorites because of God's bias towards them. The Lord favors them because of their predisposition to turn to him for help. Since the poor have no one to speak on their behalf or to listen to them, they always turn to the Lord for help. They come to the Lord with open hands and with no set expectations (since they have nothing, so to speak, they got nothing to lose) and as such are never disappointed or feel let down. It is this attitude of theirs that make them favorites to inherit God's kingdom. The beatitudes become God's promise to us when we cultivate within us the predisposition of the poor and unfortunate. We have to approach the Lord with openness of minds and hearts if we expect to be comforted by him. We have to go before the Lord with no expectations, accepting from the Lord whatever he apportions us. It is only thus that the beatitudes become for us promises that can be fulfilled in this life and the next.