SHARING IS CARING

During your life, good things came your way as bad things came the way to Lazarus. Now he is being comforted as you are in agony.

During your life, good things came your way as bad things came the way to Lazarus. Now he is being comforted as you are in agony.

The main theme of this week’s readings is the warning that the selfish and extravagant use of God’s blessings, like wealth, without sharing them with the poor and the needy is a serious sin deserving eternal punishment. It stress the Covenant responsibility of the rich for the poor, reminding us of the truth that wealth without active mercy for the poor is great wickedness. It warns us against making money the goal of our existence.

We are all rich enough to share our blessings with others. God has blessed each one of us with wealth or health or special talents or social power or political influence or a combination of many blessings.

Sharing is caring. We need to remember that sharing is the criterion of Last Judgment: Matthew (25:31ff) tells us that all six questions to be asked of each one of us by Jesus when He comes in glory as our judge are based on how we have shared our blessings from him (food, drink, home, mercy and compassion), in our brothers and sisters, anyone in need. Our choices here determine the kind of eternity we will have. It has been put this way: “Where we go hereafter depends on what we ‘go after,’ here!” Where we will arrive depends on what road we travel. We will get what we choose, what we live for. We are shaping our moral character to fit in one of two places.

Excerpted from the homily of Fr Tony Kadavil available at http://frtonyshomilies.com