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04 Aug 2013 - Eighteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Cycle C

The readings raise an issue we might not expect to encounter in scripture—inheritance—but nonetheless there it is. Qoholeth talks about doing the work and worrying while someone else ends up with the property. A person calls Jesus in to arbitrate an estate squabble between brothers, and Christ responds by telling a parable in which God asks the rich man, “ ‘The things you have prepared, to whom will they belong?’ ” The real question, however, is not who gets what but what is it all worth? Those who worry about what becomes of “the profit [which] comes . . . from . . . . toil” and the fruits of a “bountiful harvest” fall into what the Letter to the Colossians would call earthly greed. Those who work for treasure in heaven, however, “seek what is above.”

Wealth work inheritance

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Exploring the word

14 Mar 2010 - Fourth Sunday of Lent, Cycle C

Two children, a father, and an inheritance: How many stories begin this way, and how bitterly many of them end! The love of money is the root of all evil, scripture tells us. In fact that same first letter to Timothy also insists that a lover of money can never be a bishop. Yet the world is full of money-lovers, and the church is no exception. How can it be otherwise? Money solves a lot of problems in our day-to-day lives. It pays the bills, keeps a roof over our heads and food on the table. It makes the education of our children possible and health care available. It even lends a veneer of security against unseen future woes. How could any of us be indifferent to money? But in the parable we hear today the desire for money has nothing to do with securing the future or keeping the daily wolves at bay. In the story of the two sons, the love of money is all about its empty promises. A young man wants to stuff his pockets with an old man’s resources. Which young person doesn’t? What the elder has earned by the sweat of his brow, the younger seeks to squander. The son has done nothing to merit the pleasures that money can buy, yet his father inexplicably hands him the keys to the kingdom in a big fat check. The results are exactly what you’d expect if a twentysomething hit the lottery. First comes the party with the friends, then the after-party with strangers, then the real blur sets in. All of a sudden the money is gone, and God only knows in whose company he awakens, if any. What started out with a bang ends in a fearful whimper. Somehow the limits to what money can buy didn’t seem quite so close in the imagination as they do in reality. Now what? Options narrow considerably with empty pockets: Eat with the pigs, or don’t eat at all. For a Jew, it’s eat at the trough of shame or starve altogether. What the young man doesn’t count on his father’s inexhaustible love for him. How could he not know that? Because he’s young and has little experience of the full spectrum of human love, he can’t guess that his father’s treatment of him was very special. We’re the same way, of course. God treats us with the extravagant gifts of life, the world, freedom, and possibility, and we respond to our birthright as if it’s just desserts for the fact of our existence. So when we misuse our freedom and toss off the good things for the glitter, it may not occur to us that God’s love goes much deeper than ours and is still right where we left it. But it is. On this Laetare Sunday we rejoice because the moment we return to God, the love story continues. Related scripture links Other notes on Christian freedom: John 8:31-36; Rom. 6:1-23, 8:2; 1 Cor. 3:23, 6:19-20, 10:23-33; Gal. 3:23-4:7 Free to show compassion: Matt. 18:21-35 Reason to rejoice: 1 Chron. 16:31-33; Matt. 5:12; Phil. 4:4-7 Catechism links Water of baptism: CCC 694; 1214-1215; 1227-1228; 1253-1255; 1262; 1265 Story of the brothers: CCC 545; 589; 1439; 1700; 2795

Authors Alice Camille

prodigal son greed money inheritance

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God has no grandchildren

Short essays about observed trends in Roman Catholic life - Pastoral trends

As children of God, we either have a personal, direct relationship with God or not. We can never get such a relationship merely be inheriting it from parents who were children of God! Every person, every generation must make a choice to respond to God’s grace, or not. This observation comes from a theologian, David Bosch, but it really goes right back to the scriptures. Just because one was part of God’s Chosen People was no guarantee that one would not become faithless or worse. Don’t we make the same mistake today? Aren’t we somehow surprised when our children are not “grandchildren” of God merely because we live as “children” of God? Inserting children into an institution, even a church school or other church programs, is never enough. It cannot “make” them children of God! It might even lead them to reject what they find there, particularly if they sniff hypocrisy or manipulation along the way. What is helpful is something else: remembering that being a “child” of God is first and foremost a relationship. To what degree do we model such a relationship with our children? To what degree do we help them see that it is God’s love that they are experiencing? To what degree are they able to connect with a community of disciples sharing what it means to be a child of God? Everything else is merely an adventure in missing the point.

Authors Bryan Froehle

relationships children of God inheritance Community

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