GOD AND MAMMON:

September 19, 2010
Twenty-Fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time
Amos 8:4-7; 1Timothy 2:1-8; Luke 16:1-13

There is this story of three visitors who came to the house of a certain man. They sat outside under the tree. The woman of the house saw them and invited them in. The visitors asked, “is your husband in?” She said, “no, he is out on work and will arrive in the evening?”. The visitors said, then they will wait until her husband arrives, because they have something very important to offer. In the evening, when the man of the house arrived, his wife reported to him the story of the visitors waiting outside their home. So the husband went out and found them sitting under the tree. He invited them to come into his house. The visitors said, they would be happy to enter his house, but, they cannot go in all together. Only one of them would go in. They introduced themselves as “wealth”, “peace”, and “love”. They said, please go in, consult your wife and come and tell us who among us you would like to enter your house. The man went in and told his wife, “see, God has really come to visit us in the form of the three visitors. We shall chose one of them, ‘wealth, peace or love’. You know our problems; we are deeply in financial crisis. We struggle to make both ends meet. God has heard our prayers. Let us invite wealth in, our house will be filled with wealth and laughter, and we will be happy forever”. His wife, then said, “may be, we should invite peace. You know how much we suffer because of lack of peace. How long we have been struggling with mistrust and friction in relationship, anxiety and worry over our life! If peace comes in, we will be filled with joy and we will be happy forever!”. Their little daughter who was overhearing this discussion sprang up. She said, mommy, daddy, why don’t we invite love? If love comes in, we will be filled with grace, we will have a loving family, a piece of heaven on earth. And we will be happy forever. The parents decided to give into the demand of their daughter. The man of the house went out and said, “Whoever among you is love, please come in”. Love got up and started walking toward the door. Behind him wealth and peace got up and made their way into the house. At this the man of the house was surprised and said, “I do not understand you, I thought you said, only one of you will enter my house, and you asked me to chose one, but now all the three of you are coming in!” Then the visitors said: What we said is true. It is like this. Had you invited peace of wealth, they would come in alone. But now since you have chosen love, love cannot go in alone. Love is always accompanied by wealth and peace. Wherever there is love, there is wealth and peace!”

Today Jesus asks to make a choice. He tells us that our choice is between God and material possessions (mammon). We cannot chose both. It is either God or material possessions (anything other than God) to which we allocate the place of God in our lives. The interesting thing, is however, that if we chose mammon, we will end up losing God and all His graces, wealth included, and if we are to chose God, we end up gaining all, God and wealth as well. So whom do you invite into your house today—God or mammon?

Chose God and you will be rich. Chose mammon and you will be eternally poor! This is the paradox of life. In the first place, God and mammon are not equal entities for the choice. God is the creator of all the universe, of all the living and non-living things in it, all the spiritual and material blessings, all power and authority, all the heavens and earth. Mammon (the Greek word for material wealth) is only one among all his creations. Mammon has no existence in itself. It exists in relationship to others. It is the human mind that gives being and meaning to mammon. The human mind has the capacity to elevate the ‘non-existing” or “relatively-existing” mammon to the level of God. Greed is the feed on which mammon swells, grows and develops into a God. When a person is enveloped in greed, all that he would see is “money”, and the highest worth and value in life is “money”. Money, then assumes the yardstick, the measure of relationships and moral practices. Whatever can earn you the maximum money is good for you. Whatever can give you the highest dividend and return in terms of money is the supreme value for you. A man of mammon is blind. Such a person will perish in his greed.
Amos noticed how the people of Israel were possessed by their material possessions as they were competing each other in exploiting the poor, taking advantage of the weak and devising new plans for cheating. Corruption was written broad on their faces. Anything was alright for them if it would enrich themselves. Such ungodliness, insincerity, dishonesty and abominable practices were rampant on one side even as they gloried in the name of God and offered Him worship. Amos warned them of the wrath of God on them, for they were desecrating Yahweh and His temple all for the sake of mammon.

Jesus came 500 years after Amos and found the social situation remained the same, deep in corruption. This is why He demanded His disciples to be trustworthy, honest, loyal and sincere in their dealings with money, material wealth and possessions. His parable of the dishonest servant reminded them that they are all servants of whom are demanded accountability and transparency of dealings.

2000 years after Jesus’ cry for honesty and sincerity, our world does not seem to have taken His message to the heart. Corruption remains to be one of the problems that we have come to recognize as widespread, deep rooted and rotting our social and familial structure. The last general elections in the Philippines was fought on lines of corruption, and the present president made his impact with the slogan, “no corruption, no poverty!”. But how do we eradicate corruption? What is the corruption that we usually talk about? We talk aloud of corruption in the government and public office, corruption in the proportion of billions of pesos/dollars. We feel corruption can be healed if we are able to punish the “corrupt officials” at the top, if we can make them accountable and if we can terminate them from their posts. Yet, if we look at the situation through the eyes of Jesus we come to realize that punishing the “those who are caught” will not solve the problem. Rather, we need to strike at the bottom and begin with our children and each family. Corruption in business practices and governance is just the tip of the iceberg. They simply indicate the collective mentality of corruption in the society. Yes, it is the corrupt human mind that needs to be treated first. We need to heal the corrupt minds, mentalities, trade practices, and corruption in relationships.

The Jesus’ principle:
Jesus prescribes the cure: If you are sincere in simple matters you will be sincere in great matters as well. If you are trust worthy in small things you will be trustworthy in great things as well. So, here is the rub: be trustworthy and honest in small matters. We need to teach our children to be sincere and honest in small as well as great things. We need to remind ourselves and our children that it is bad to tell a lie, it is a sin to be untruthful. Be it a white lie, grey lie or a black lie, it is equally bad. A lie is always a lie. When I absolve myself by the thought that it is “only a white lie” I am corrupting my mind. We need to teach our children that cheating is always cheating, be it in big matters or small ones. We need to remind ourselves stealing is bad and a sin, be it one peso, a small little thing, five pesos, five thousand pesos or five billion pesos. If we are able to enter the mind of Jesus regarding the practice of the Ten Commandments in spirit and truth, we will overcome corruption in all forms.

The test of integrity is not in the ability to do great things and to be honest in big matters, rather in your sincerity in small matters and the fidelity in small things. It is the small things in life that make us great. It is the small things that define how trust-worthy you are!

How truthful am I in my words? How honest am I in my dealings in business, trade and employment? Do I absolve myself in cheating—on relationships, studies, trade and business practices?