He was talking about the staggeringly better news that heaven is coming to us, in fact is coming to us today. The Church teaches that at every Mass heaven touches earth, that the Risen and Glorified Jesus is present to us and places His life in our hands. And because it is His life in us, His life in us today, then we are no longer “poor in spirit.”

If the Beatitudes are platitudes, that may be because you are not intentional enough yet to be startled by them.