Just a Thought
Over the next two weeks we shall hear from Chapter Sixteen of Luke’s Gospel. It contains two parables which, with very different examples, both present a teaching on the use that one should make of money in order to store up treasure ‘in heaven.’ The passage that begins Chapter sixteen of Luke`s Gospel this Sunday always catches us by surprise.
Every day we hear stories of managers and agents who squander the money entrusted to them and are subsequently dismissed. Accounts of falsified documents, misuse of funds, forgery and counterfeiting, etc. — Jesus had no dearth of material here. He might borrow a little here and there from some current story that his listeners might relate, confident that they would recognise and associate it with what he would say. What is surprising, even shocking, is what is said after the story. We expect to hear Jesus vigorously denounce this swindling — commonplace, to be sure, but no less commendable for that— saying: ‘Treat someone else’s goods with scrupulous honesty.’
Such a denunciation and teaching would hardly disturb us. We know well enough the various reasons for the necessity of honesty, as well as the appropriateness of virtuous condemnations. We subscribe to such things already. And we are not slow to preach good conduct, not infrequently with such satisfaction as almost to say: ‘I thank you, my God, that I am not like so many people today: thieves, crooks, cheats… or like this manager!’ Isn’t it a bit like the publican and the sinner? To be sure the Gospels condemn all sorts of dishonesty. But, as we know and have already seen, they do not dwell on the commonplaces of good conduct. Let us then read this passage from Luke with the assumption that Jesus is offering an unexpected lesson that might well disturb us or put us on the defensive, even those of us who behave with complete honesty with respect to money, especially if it belongs to someone else.
Was the manager in this story in fact guilty? His conduct after having received notice must make one think so. But it does not matter much. He does not waste any time trying to justify himself. He does not seem even to be under the illusion that he can find a similar position elsewhere. He immediately deals with the most pressing concern: securing his future. Digger of ditches? Never! Beggar? What a horrible disgrace that would be for a man like him! His fertile imagination suggests an acceptable solution. He was asked to render his accounts. He does so more quickly than one would have thought. Then he approaches his master’s debtors one by one. Each must think he is the recipient of a particular favour. The manager tears up their bills and gives them new ones, in proper and due form, but for a much smaller amount. (To get an idea of the size of these ‘gifts’ the first refers to fifty times forty-five litres of oil ie. two thousand two hundred and fifty litres. The second — twenty times four hundred fifty litres of wheat ie. one hundred and sixty thousand, fifty litres of wheat! Quite a gift: it amounts to the cost of six hundred days of work! One would surely be indebted to the manager for far less than this). (Table of measures and money — Bible de Jerusalem). A beautiful bit of cunning! It is the master who pays the price of the transaction. The relieved debtors are at the mercy of a manager who controls a formidable means of blackmail: they will have to do what he says and hold their tongues.
We find such dealings reported in our newspapers. Typically, a long time passes before a scandal is uncovered. Those who benefit from the swindle are not at all that eager — for good reason— to make their knowledge and testimony, which would unmask the culprit, and make it a matter of public knowledge. We know perfectly well the defence that will be offered: ‘All the figures look correct. How can you prove that there has been a falsification of the debts, all the documents are valid, written and signed by the manager!’ And don’t we find ourselves dumbfounded, and indeed impressed, with the cleverness of the trick, though not of course, approving of the dishonesty and bad faith of the crook? This is the scene Jesus sets, to draw from the story an important and unexpected lesson (For he is the ‘master’ who praises the cleverness of the deceitful manager. Such praise would be too unlikely in the mouth of the one who was the victim of such criminal acts. If he acknowledged the adroitness of his dishonest manager, it would be with great anger. Probably, he would conclude that such a man was more of a thief than he had first thought). ‘You see the resourcefulness of the children of this world? Ah! You children of light, would that you were as capable as they are! How so? By securing your future, and without delay or dawdling. Tomorrow will be too late.’ See here, Our Lord, is not so much praising the managers actions but using them for an example for the children of light. Secure your future in the kingdom of heaven, by good works and charity and do it now, without delay!
Money, used as a personified idol — can only deceive: it is false, dishonest; the one who relies on it goes quickly astray. After all, it must be abandoned someday, for no-one among the dead finds wealth of any more use. Remember the man who pulled down his barns to build bigger ones to store his bumper crops.
So, what is the only way to use it profitably and be assured of a future in the eternal realm? Sharing it with those who need it to live, giving it to those who beg. We have already found the same warning in Luke’s Gospel: ‘Sell your belongings and give alms. Provide money bags for yourselves that do not wear out, an inexhaustible treasure in heaven that no thief can reach nor moth destroy.’ (Luke 12:33) This command here takes on a particular edge, after the story of the dishonest manager and his ‘example.’ For it is said that the poor, who will become our friends, thanks to our almsgiving, will be there to welcome us into heaven.
The first lesson of the story-parable is followed immediately by another. Jesus imparts a maxim of universal importance: ‘The person who is trustworthy in very small matters is also trustworthy in great ones; and the person who is dishonest in small matters is also dishonest in great ones.’ Such an axiom is verified in the most diverse situations. How, then, could we object to Jesus’ application of it here, to the parable and the lesson he drew from it first?
If, therefore, you are not trustworthy with dishonest wealth, who will trust you with true wealth? i.e. gain for yourself friends in heaven, who will trust you with lasting wealth that will not desert you at the hour of your death? The goods of this world are only ‘someone else’s money,’ given that you may manage them according to the will of God, their Master. If you have not been worthy of such trust here, you deprive yourself of the heritage that you expect as your very right. Jesus repeats what he has just said. There is only one honest and prudent way to use material goods: by helping the poor with them! Thus, and only thus, will the Master say to us: ‘Well done good and faithful servant. Since you were faithful in small matters, I will give you great responsibilities. Come share your Master’s joy!’
As a matter of fact, this gives considerable importance to the evangelical use of money. It becomes a decisive criterion for receiving the inheritance of the kingdom! But familiarity with Luke should dispel any surprise, and we have read quite a bit of his Gospel these past Sundays. No one warns about the same thing over and over like Luke. Money will burn a Christians fingers. Far from accumulating it for oneself, though fair and honest dealings and as a result of an enterprising spirit, one must hasten to share it with the poor, going so far as to ‘renounce all one’s possessions’ in order to become a disciple as we heard proclaimed only a short while ago. (Luke 14:33)
As a conclusion to this passage, Luke reports a striking saying of Jesus that one also reads in Matthew (though in a different context): ‘No servant (slave) 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 God and mammon (money).’One can argue over what happens when one has two master’s at one time. But the slave neither chooses his master nor chooses to have more than one. He might very well detest both. To have two master’s can cause tension, it is true, for it is difficult not to compare them; one may be more disagreeable than the other, or even odious. But this is not what is important. What the saying proclaims is undeniable when it is a question, as it is here, of the ‘service’ of God and Money. ‘To serve’ with respect to God, has a strong significance; it implies an engagement of the whole person, an absolute preference, an undivided love with a cultural overtone. So, we say in the second Eucharistic Prayer: ‘We thank you for choosing us to be in your presence and serve you.’ ‘Serving’ amounts to adoring, worshipping.
Applied to money, the term means the same thing, for Jesus speaks of money as an idol. The Gospel calls it ‘mammon,’ a name that personifies it as a power that rules the world. We see all too often that money can be an idol to which everything is sacrificed. The poor and misguided destroy themselves seeking its favours; they often let themselves be bought, renouncing every human dignity for a pittance. As for the rich, the point hardly needs to be said. But it is the whole world, even today, that finds itself tempted by the cult of Mammon. It is a great and sad temptation with which the whole world is faced, with such aggressive propaganda proclaiming its power, publicly urging each and everyone of us to have as much of it as possible, no matter what the cost. It is one of the devil’s greatest tools. One needs a great deal of determination and grace to resist the incessant hammering of Satan. You cannot serve both ~God and the god of Money! The Gospel teaches us how to resist the devil and money. Do as Jesus tells us— there is no compromise — ‘Use money, tainted as it is, to win you friends, and thus make sure that when it fails you, they will welcome you into the tents of eternity.’ Share it with the poor.
And remember:
‘Jesus Christ was rich, but he became poor for your sake, to make you rich out of his poverty.’
