What’s your attitude toward wealth—your own and that of others? Most of us have a certain ambivalence toward money. Too much of it seems somehow sinful—or at least tempting toward the same. Too little is equally or even more debilitating. So, how much is enough? How do you find the balance and how does your faith inform the decisions you make about money?

Raise your hand if you’re as busy as I am! Most people I know claim to be running flat out all the time. “Crazy-busy” is a term I hear a lot. We all have a high regard for the amount of industry we pack into the average day.

A man went on an extended trip. He called his servants together and delegated responsibilities. To one he gave 5,000 dollars, to another 2,000, to a third 1,000. Then he left. Right off, the first servant went to work and doubled his master’s investment. The second did the same. But the man with the single thousand dug a hole and carefully buried his master’s money.

Once upon a time, there was a servant who worked for a wealthy man who spent much of his time traveling, increasing his wealth day by day. The rich man didn’t do any work himself. He didn’t do the digging, the planting—all he harvested was the plenty.

We ask to be made good and faithful servants.

Religious obligations are often presumed to be pious things we do to please God. What if God wants us to be who we were created to be most of all?

Any gift from God is an occasion for our greatest praise. Christ, however, often reminds us that praise merely begins our acceptance of God’s grace. What follows is responsibility.

Even to the birds was it said, “Be fruitful and multiply.” Do you wish to hold as a great blessing what was given to birds? Who can be ignorant, that it was given indeed by the voice of God? But use these goods, if you receive them; and rather think how you may nourish those who have been born, that others may be born. —Saint Augustine