Reflection for the 18th Sunday of Ordinary Time, Cycle C

The lectionary translation of the readings for this Sunday can be found HERE

1st Reading:

Ecclesiastes 1:2, 2:21-23

Our first reading today comes from one of the Wisdom books of the Hebrew tradition. This book is a collection of reflections on life which are, overall, quite negative. At best, the message is that wisdom has some advantage over foolishness. It was evidently chosen for this Mass because of the Parable of the Rich Fool that we will hear in the Gospel selection.

2nd Reading:

Colossians 3:1–5, 9-11

Last week’s selection from Colossians spoke of dying with Christ in Baptism and rising with him to new life. This selection builds on that theme. As such, it coincides with the Gospel reading which is rare for a second reading; second readings are semi-continuous and not chosen particularly to go with the Gospel reading.

Gospel:

Luke 12:13–21

“…I shall say to myself, ‘Now as for you, you have so many good things stored up for many years, rest, eat, drink, be merry!’ But God said to him, ‘You fool, this night your life will be demanded of you; and the things you have prepared, to whom will they belong?’ Thus will it be for the one who stores up treasure for himself but is not rich in what matters to God.” _{Lk 12:19:21}

Setting & Parallels:

This incident occurs while Jesus is on his journey to Jerusalem. It is not told about in the other Gospels.

Verse by Verse:

Lk 12:13 “…share the inheritance with me.” | Hebrew tradition has strict norms on the sharing of inheritance designed to foster stable continuation of the family. The implication here is that the older brother, who would have become in charge at the death of the father, was not following the established norms. Still, the brother asking for Jesus’ help seems to be the object of the parable.

Lk 12:15 “…Take care to guard against all greed…” | The UBS Handbook suggests that this may be translated “Beware of all covetousness.” The Concise Oxford English Dictionary defines greed as “intense and selfish desire for wealth, power or food.”

Lk 12:20 “…You fool…” | The UBS Handbook says the Greek word speaks of culpable ignorance.

Lk 12:21 “…rich in what matters to God.” | This passage does not immediately define what matters to God but clearly indicates that worldly concerns do not. Lk 12:31-34 instructs us to seek his kingdom and not worry about worldly things. It seems to me that v. 31 should be part of next Sunday’s reading, but it is left out for some reason.

What the 1st hearers heard:

Dependence on worldly possessions cannot give eternal life.

What would change if our community really heard this Gospel?

We would reassess what it is that we spend our energies upon and why.

What is the good news in this Gospel?

If we spend our energies on what matters to God we can experience eternal life.

Gospel Reflection

Being Rich in What Matters to God

I have a friend who likes to remind me, once in a while, of what I used to be like when I was younger. I used to get frustrated and yell and scream. Raging didn’t do any good but I still thought it was the way I would accomplish my will. Luckily, when she reminds me of that, she also acknowledges what a decent person I’ve become over the years. God knows I’ve tried to become that better person.

Today’s Gospel selection raises the question; “What matters to God?”. Me getting my way certainly isn’t what matters to God. Jesus says, in verse 31, that God wants us to “…seek his kingdom…”. We’ve talked about that before; how “the kingdom of God” means “the reign of God”. And I’ve tried to give some idea of how that might be acted out in our daily lives. But I’m afraid I haven’t been that helpful to people. Today I’m going to suggest that becoming that better person is what seeking his kingdom means.

Here is the theory. God communicated to us first… by the act of creating us. We respond to God by the manner in which we live the life he gave us. I didn’t do that very well when I was younger. Either way, the manner in which we live our lives, therefor, is prayer; God communicates, we respond. The act of living our day-to-day lives is our most basic spirituality. Becoming what he created us to be is how we let him reign in our lives. That’s because he created us to be a person who can love and be loved. The more we accomplish that, the more we are living in his reign of love.

I think the modern spiritual writer Mathew Kelly gets it right when he encourages us to become “the best version of ourselves”. When I googled him to refresh my memory, the AI generated answer said; “He [Mathew Kelly] proposes that this idea represents humanity’s essential purpose and God’s dream for each individual, encouraging people to grow into the person they were designed to be rather than imitating others.” I agree, but be careful with the concept of simply saying the best version of “yourself”. Remember that the “yourself” Mathew is talking about is the “yourself” God created us to be.

Yet, we oftentimes like to be somebody else. Sometimes we project a self-created persona to the world in order to protect the fragility of our real selves. Sometimes we project a persona that we feel others will accept. Maybe because we want to be liked, we let the concepts of others define who we supposedly are. Sometimes we try to become the person we think we need to be in order to be wealthy or powerful or looked up to, etc. Maybe there are other reasons we create a false persona.

This self-created persona may be very different from the real self whom God created us to be and may have taken over our conscious identity. And, I think, that is not spiritually or psychologically healthy. That may be what the rich man in today’s Gospel story did by storing up his riches so he could be a man of leisure. He seems to have defined himself by his wealth and spent much energy on protecting it.

In my life, I initially spent a lot of effort trying to figure out “what” God wanted me to be. It wasn’t until later in life that I discovered the true question is “who” did God create me to be? I’ve now spent a lot of effort trying to identify the unfruitful manner in which I use my personality traits to be that person I created. The more I use my traits to be the person God created me to be, the richer my life is, the richer are my relationships and the richer are the lives of those with whom I come into contact. I become the rich man but leave the fool behind.

It is only by becoming the person God created us to be that we can be in right relationship with God, right relationship with others and right relationship with life itself. It is only by becoming the person God created us to be that we can be truly happy, truly at peace and truly fruitful in life. It is the only way we can be the kind of person who can love and be loved. It is the most basic way of living in God’s kingdom.

God bless you all…

Personal Reflection:

Question:

What words or phrases attracted your attention during the Liturgy of the Word on Sunday? What connection do those words or phrases have to your day-to-day life? (Why do you think they attracted your attention?) What might God be trying to say to you through these words or phrases? What response should you make? What action should you take?

Alternative:

Reflect upon/Share about your answer to the question “Who/what would other people say that you are?” Who/what do you think God created you to be? How can you lessen the differences between who you think God created you to be and who/what other people think you are?

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