Twenty-fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time

Lectionary: 135

"For the children of this world
are more prudent in dealing with their own generation
than are the children of light.
I tell you, make friends for yourselves with dishonest wealth,
so that when it fails, you will be welcomed into eternal dwellings.

Throughout his gospel, Saint Luke describes a God who clearly favors the poor over the rich, and consistently chooses the overlooked, the elderly, the sick, crippled, blind, mute, and deaf. In a patriarchal society, He also has a predilection for women. The Jesus the Evangelist gives us is born in a manger, homeless, despised, mocked, crucified, and finally buried in a borrowed grave. Although the Messiah is of a noble family, Joseph and his kin are nonetheless unknown nonentities in the halls of power. Anyone might claim descent from King David, but that’s not a free ticket to anywhere. When the Lord God chose to be born in the world, he chose poverty, homelessness, and obscurity.

Where Saint Matthew says, "Blessed are the poor in spirit," Saint Luke says simply, "Blessed are the poor." He does not qualify their poverty with any particular virtue; rather, they are beloved and favored by God because they have only God as their support. When God appears in human flesh, he is welcomed by poor shepherds, devout old people, an itinerant construction worker and his betrothed. 

Although we love the Lord, few of us can claim the poverty of his Holy Family. We are not destitute and we use the wealth of this world despite Saint Luke's calling it dishonest. For we know that all money is tainted. 

Tellers and cashiers know that; they wash their hands often. But more importantly, the money we earn, spend, and save has been used by drug dealers, kidnappers, scam artists, thieves, greedy capitalists, avaricious investors, and corrupt politicians. We are immersed in the same currency that was used to buy slaves in the 19th century; contraband alcohol during Prohibition; and drugs since the 1960s. Currency may change from American dollars and European euros to English pounds, Chinese Yuan, Mexican Pesos, and Indian Rupees; but it's the same money that controlled human life before the Roman empire collapsed. Roman soldiers were gambling at the foot of the cross with the money in our pockets.

If Roman Catholics can boast of our apostolic succession from St. Peter to Pope Leo XIV, everyone can boast of the money that has been used since Jacob's sons sold their brother Joseph into Egyptian slavery. Money may be used for sacred purposes, but it has never been baptized. 

In Italy, in the early years of the thirteenth century, Saint Francis urged his friars to avoid all contact with money. They should work for food only, and beg if necessary. But they should never own or carry gold, silver, or copper coins. His statue in our chapel shows him treading on a bag of coins while, in the opposite corner, the Virgin Mary crushes a serpent underfoot. They despise both.

In today's world Francis might urge his disciples to use cash only, and never to buy on credit. But it's impossible to carry out the work of the gospel without air travel and online purchasing, and so we use credit cards freely, and without scruples. 

As Catholics and Christians, we may have earned our money honestly, but we know it's tainted. And so Saint Luke's Gospel urges us to "make friends for yourselves with dishonest wealth, so that when it fails, you will be welcomed into eternal dwellings."

It will fail someday. We know that. Sometimes coins, cash, and bank accounts are useless even in this world. In an economy stricken with hyperinflation money becomes practically useless; you can’t buy a loaf of bread with a wheelbarrow of cash. Anyone without friends, family, and connections starves during hyperinflation.. 

The older we get, and the more often we attend funerals, we remember that you can’t take it with you. We ask the Lord to remember the virtue and good deeds of our loved ones, for we know their wealth means nothing to God. When Jesus declared, “It’s easier for a camel to pass through a needle's eye than for the wealthy to be saved!” his astonished disciples asked, “Then who can be saved?” 

He replied, “It’s impossible for men, but for God all things are possible.”

In today’s Gospel, his warning is more ominous, 

No servant can serve two masters.

He will either hate one and love the other,

or be devoted to one and despise the other.

You cannot serve both God and mammon."

We use money; but we do not love it. We own it; but it must never own us. 

What happens to people who love money more than God? 

I have been a chaplain in two hospitals and I have heard, from the edges of a conversation, how hospitals, HMOs, and insurance companies negotiate for patients as if they are widgets, commodities, or sacks of rice to be bought, sold, invested, and traded. We have so many beds we need to fill. To improve our income and expense balance, we have to risk increasing the number of surgeries we perform, of organs harvest and transplant. We hear of human trafficking within the United States; and surrogate mothers, and wombs for rent, and black markets who deal with living, human organs. It's all about money. Aldous Huxley, writing Brave New World in 1931 predicted a factory where mentally impaired women are used as wombs; but these unfortunate souls suffer no loss since they were carefully bred for that purpose. They have no pain in childbirth and enjoy their special sisterhood. 

This is what must happen to any people, to any society, to any nation who loves its money more than its God.

Saint Augustine sadly remarked, “We use the things we should love and love the things we should use.”

“Make friends for yourselves with dishonest wealth, so that when it fails, you will be welcomed into eternal dwellings.” We might save money but it cannot save us. We might own it, but it cannot own us. We use it, but it uses fools who think they own, control, or manage money. Remember the poverty of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph; and handle money like you handle rat poison.