Poverty? This is a complex word, says Catholic religious sister, economist, and secretary of the Dicastery for Integral Human Development, Alessandra Smerilli. In her article that opens this month’s issue, she adds, it is doubly complex if you consider it in the light of a women’s perspective.

Who are “the poor”? Are they the ones to be pitied like all those (men and women) who do not possess anything and are forced into a difficult and often painful life? Alternatively, is there another poverty that stems from the idea of a different kind of happiness, severing, yes “severing”, ties with consumption and the marketplace, but at the same time claiming freedom of choice, and equality? Yes, there is a poverty as a method, as prophecy, even as a form of rebellion and transgression. This is the poverty that liberates, as Pope Francis puts it. A poverty that enriches us.