Two business competitors argued at length about certain shady business practices. Finally, one said to the other, "Let's be clear about one thing. There are lots of ways to make money but there is only one honest way." "What way is that?" the second man asked. "Just as I suspected, you don't know," the first man replied.
A company treasurer had called a meeting of the sales staff because she detected a pattern of fraud in their expense reports. "I'll begin with our East Coast representative," she said. "It seems clear that you've been overcharging the company for your meals. Tell me, how did you manage to spend sixty- four dollars a day for food in New York City?" To which the East Coast representative replied, "Easy! I skipped breakfast!"
"When it comes to a question of money, everybody is of the same religion." Yet truer words were never spoken about our generation, in which almost anything goes as long as it makes money for somebody.
Two thousand years ago, Jesus said to the power brokers of His time, "No servant can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, You cannot serve God and money" (Luke tells us that "The Pharisees, who were lovers of money, heard all this, and they scoffed at Him"). As the people of a generation which has transformed "greed" from vice into virtue, are we scoffing at Jesus' warning?
Jesus is telling us once again that nothing -- not even our money -- should ever take priority over our right relationship with God. And in this time of ours which seems bent on canonizing greed, it is urgent that we disciples of Jesus Christ deliver that message through the example of our own lives.
The most important single thing in your life at this moment is for you to be able to enter into a direct encounter with God. The most important single thing in your life at this moment is to know, down at the center of your being, how to be open to the movement of God's Spirit within you. That's your number one priority in life. It's more important than your health. It's more important than your job. It's more important than your family relationships. It's more important than all your other relationships. And, as Jesus tells us over-and-over again in the Gospels, its even more important than your money. In truth, the quality of your family relationships and all your other relationships depends on it. Moreover, your peace of mind, your peace of soul -- the quality of your life -- depends on it.
An enormously rich man complained to his psychiatrist that despite his great wealth which enabled him to possess everything money could buy, he felt miserable. The doctor took the wealthy man by the hand and escorted him to a window overlooking the street. "What do you see?" asked the psychiatrist. "I see men, women and children," the man answered. Then the psychiatrist escorted the man to a mirror. "Now what do you see?" he asked. "I see only myself," the man answered. Then the psychiatrist said, "In the window there is glass and in the mirror there is glass. And when you look through the glass in the window you can see others. But behind the glass in the mirror is a layer of silver. When silver is added, you cease to see others, you see only yourself."
Whenever your devotion to money and material things causes you to be self-centered you are in flagrant denial of God's intention for your life, and you are contradicting the example given by our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.
Our Lord came as a Man For Others, not to be ministered unto but to minister, not to be served but to serve. Our Lord placed His whole life in the service of His heavenly Father and, within that context, in the service of all mankind.
The presupposition of today's Gospel parable and every parable of Jesus is that God loves you infinitely, that He is calling you into a union of life with Himself, that this intimate union with God is the most important thing in your life, and that nothing in life should take priority over it. Anything in your life that you cannot relate to your union with God is not worth wasting your time on. Jesus is saying that as long as you allow money to be your master, there is no way you can say "Yes!" to God. And even if you should become the richest person in the world, in terms of your ability to grow into the uniquely beautiful person God made you to be, your money is worthless.
Money will buy a bed, but not sweet dreams. Money will buy books, but not wisdom. Money will buy a house, but not a home. Money will buy pleasure, but not genuine joy. Money will buy a crucifix, but not a Servant Savior.
Several years ago a national magazine published a kind of "open letter" from a mother to her daughter. It said, in part:
My child, what can I give you?
I should like to give you everything so that you lack for nothing, not even one single desire. But I know that for want of many things I have come to be satisfied with what I have and to think of others and their needs.
I give you my personal presence in order that you will have the security you need during your childhood. I give you my ears, in the sense that I will never be too busy to listen to you.
I give you opportunities to work so that you might learn to do it without shame and come to enjoy the satisfaction of work well done.
I give you my counsel, but only when it is necessary or you ask for it so that you might avoid some of the mistakes I have made.
I give you my consolation when you have failed or feel discouraged, but I will not always protect you from the consequences of your sins.
I give you instruction in the way of the Lord, so that when you grow older, you will never depart from it.
I give you my daily prayers that the Lord will keep you and guide you in such a way that you, my child, will be a woman who will serve and glorify our Heavenly Father.
I give you my unconditional love, which means that I accept you without reservation, just as you are and will be.
These things I give you with all my love. Mother. Isn't it amazing what money can't buy?
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