Homily for the Eighteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year C, 2022

Not Bigger Barns, But Love Cultivated Here

Rev. Marcel Divine Emeka Okwara, CSsR

Homily for the Eighteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year C

St. Bridget Catholic Church, Minneapolis, MN

Sunday, July 31, 2022

Today’s three readings speak of that age-long spiritual truth about the need to detach oneself from the goods of this world. But this detachment does not call for hatred of the material world or hatred of the flesh. Platonic dualism which sees this world or flesh or matter as bad is not biblical. The right biblical attitude to the goods of this world is to lightly hold them even as we acknowledge and celebrate them. The first reading taken from the extraordinary book of Ecclesiastes or Qoheleth says, “Vanity of vanities! All things are vanity!” Vanity in Hebrew is “hebel,” which designates something that evaporates, something that comes and goes. It is like a vapor, a spray. It appears and then disappears. In his old age, King Solomon has experienced power, sensual pleasure, but in the passage for today, his attention is on another worldly good, namely economic advantage. He says, “Here is one who has labored with wisdom and knowledge and skill, and yet to another who has not labored over it, he must leave his property.” What’s he saying? The great American figure, Steve Jobs was a man of great skill, tech know-how, and rare intelligence. He put his whole life into inventing the best smartphone in the world called the iPhone. But on October 5, 2011, I was holding a parish council meeting in St. Gerard Majella Church, Baton Rouge, Louisiana, when my iPhone notified me of a breaking news, “Steve Jobs of Apple Dies at 56.” His passion for innovating the next big thing did not prevent him from dying and leaving his company to someone else. The business he co-founded will be passed on to other generations he did not even know. The next generation might actually decide to break it up or to sell it. The very thing he has given his whole life to is only for a short time. In my pastoral ministry, I have heard Qoheleth: “Father, all my life, I put all my heart and soul into that business. Now, it is in the hands of my children who are not even grateful.” So, whatever we have: homes, property, real estate etc. and are, CEO, director, etc. only last for a moment, and then fade. Should this depress and demoralize us? Not at all! Enjoy the goods you have, but don’t cling to them obsessively. Enjoy the money you made and appreciate the business you created. But don’t cling on them as if your entire life depends on them and as though they are the center of your life. 

In the context of Qoheleth, we look at today’s Gospel taken from Luke 12:13-21. Jesus was asked to do something very practical: “Teacher, tell my brother to share the inheritance with me.” Something like this is being said in lawyers offices all over the country. Families fight all time about inheritance just as they did in Jesus’ time. In one particular case that I am aware of, a sister did not want to share the family inheritance with her other sister. She wanted the family house and other rented houses owned by their parents simply because when she was struggling financially, their elderly mom asked her to move in with her. After the death of their mom, she wanted everything for herself. Eventually, the case went to court and the two sisters became enemies. 

Responding to the request, Jesus used the opportunity to teach a pivotal spiritual lesson: “Take care to guard against all greed, for though one may be rich, one’s life does not consist of possessions.” Honestly, I want those words of the Lord printed boldly on billboards and mounted on every major highway, on airports, on Wall street and main streets. I want them on banners and hanging in front of Churches. I want them on stickers and pasted on people’s refrigerators. Why? Because it is an enduring deep spiritual truth. Notice that Jesus is not denouncing possessions in themselves; he is not urging everyone to get rid of their possessions and property. He is telling everyone not to make possessions the foundation of life because life does  not consist of possessions. The great British scholar, C. S. Lewis admonished, “Don’t let your happiness depend on something you may lose.” Amazing! Isn’t it? Enjoy the goods of this world, but don’t live for them and don’t base your life upon them. When it comes to earthly possessions, don’t cling to them with a desperate grip. Hold them lightly by the finger-tips, not deep in the palm of your hand. Don’t become sad, depressed, and frustrated when you don’t have them. And if you have them and then lose them, consider not suicide. In 2014, Forbes published a study which was originally published in the British Journal of Psychiatry that shows that the 2008 recession across the U.S., Canada and Europe claimed more than 10,000 “economic suicides.”

After that Jesus narrates a very devastating parable of a man who wants to build bigger barns. He is like a hedge fund manager, a private equity investor, and a very successful businessman. He is rich, but wants to be richer. He is a millionaire, but wants to be a billionaire. He wants to tire down the old barns and build something bigger to accommodate and broaden his wealth. The man in this story is the symbol of obsessive greed. He has a lot but still wants more. To him the Lord addresses, “You fool, this night your life will be demanded of you; and the things you have prepared, to whom will they belong?” Life here is not just your life in the physical sense but the meaning of your life. What is your life all about? If your life is required of you today, what would you show the Lord? Your bigger barns? Your real estate? Your growing business? Your fat bank account? Is that all? Trust me, you don’t want to go there with simply bigger barns. Now, what’s the cure to obsessive greed? Don’t look too far for the answer. Look at the words of today’s second reading: “If you were raised with Christ, seek what is above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. Think of what is above, not what is on earth.” St. Paul is not asking us to solely love the spiritual and to hate the material world. Paul was a good Jew and has nothing against the material world. He is rather asking us to value God supremely. Once God is the supreme value of your life, you will know what to do with whatever worldly goods you may attain. C. S. Lewis said “Nothing you have not given away will ever really be yours.” Cardinal Francis George right before he died said, “The only thing you take with you in the life to come are the things you have given away on earth.” What you have in the heavenly realm is the love you cultivated here below. It is not bigger barns filled with stuff. It is not the wealth or power you acquired and procured. The only thing you have in the heavenly realm is the love you cultivated here below. That’s why Jesus says, “Do not store your treasure on earth where moth and decay destroy… But store up treasure in heaven” (Matt. 6:19-20).