August 5, 2007
Pentecost X

Enough

I think that Jesus' teachings around money and possessions may be harder for our age and generation to follow than many of his commandments; we often concentrate on the other ones, but this may be the hardest. After all, we're brought up to consume, from an early age we are being bombarded by all sorts of messages that tell us to have, to want, to need more and more things. We're trained to be consumers and when we don't consume, we're told that because consumers don't have confidence, the economy is faltering. In other words, if you're not buying, it's your fault your neighbor is unemployed. So Jesus' words, "beware of greed," beware of wanting more of what you already have enough of, go against the grain in ways which are deeper than we may always comprehend.

Jesus' point of course is to show that the farmer's formula for the good life, "eat, drink and be merry", is the wrong one. For like everything else he has accumulated, even his soul is on loan, and now the owner wants it back. And the sting of Jesus' words lie in the question at the end of the parable, "Who will get what you have prepared for yourself?" It's easy to become enslaved by greed. We find ourselves driven by the urge for more, more, more. More to eat, more to drink, more to wear, more to entertain us, more to distract our minds. And every time we surrender to that inner urge for gratification we lose a little bit more of that inner freedom that allows us to exercise one of the chief human powers, the power to choose to give of ourselves towards that which is eternal, God. .

Silito

Take a look at some of the previous messages from the Rector