Year C 18th Sunday in Ordinary Time

Ecc. 1:2, 2:21-23; Col. 3:1-5, 9-11; Lk 12:13-21

Today's Reading from the Gospel of Luke teaches us that life does not consist in the abundance of possessions. A rich and meaningful life cannot be drawn out of it.

At the same time, we cannot deny that possessions, although they are transient, have a strange influence on the human mind.


The whole history of human race had been a struggle to acquire wealth and power. The ancient clans of prehistoric times fought to acquire wealth. Kings fought to expand their kingdom and build large empires.

Organized raiding of settlements began with the appearance of Homo sapiens some 315,000 years ago, with the occurrence of economic and social shifts associated with sedentism.

The most ancient archaeological records of what could have been a prehistoric massacre are at the site of Jebel Sahaba, committed by the Natufians against a population associated with the Qadan culture of far northern Sudan. The cemetery contains a large number of skeletons that are approximately 13,000 to 14,000 years old, almost half of them with arrowheads embedded in their skeletons, which indicates that they may have been the casualties of warfare
At the site of Nataruk in Turkana, Kenya, numerous 10,000-year-old human remains were found with possible evidence of major traumatic injuries, including obsidian bladelets embedded in the skeletons, that should have been lethal. According to the original study, published in January 2016, the region was a "fertile lakeshore landscape sustaining a substantial population of hunter-gatherers" where pottery had been found, suggesting storage of food and sedentism.
As civilizations grew techniques of warfare also improved. Massacre moved up from hundreds to thousands. Now it has reached to the level of intercontinental missiles able to carry highly potential atomic and nuclear weapons. All these are just for acquiring transient possessions and power.
There are many rulers who killed their own siblings to hold power. Sultan Mehmet III killed all of his 19 brothers. Caracalla murdered his brother Greta to avoid being Co-Roman Emperors. Cleopatra VII killed three siblings. Shah Jahan killed all his brothers to seize power. History has a long list of rulers who annihilated their own siblings to get power. There are many rulers who executed the members of their own family. Elizabeth 1, Henry VIII, Aurangzeb, Herod the Great and many more like them.
What we have seen in large scale in the world is seen in every individual, in our family and society. But we learn a great lesson from history that whatever is built on the blood and tears of others did not have peaceful existence and did not last long. Wealth and power amassed through unjust means will not give the comfort that it should give. Today's First Reading from the Book of Ecclesiastes affirms it. The Book starts with the words: “Vanity of vanities! All is vanity.”

Bible does not condemn wealth altogether. In the Old Testament there are many examples of people who God blessed with material possessions. Abraham, Job, David, Solomon, Jacob are some examples of people who were indeed owners of much material wealth, which came from God. In the book of Malachi (3:10-12) we read: “Bring ye all the tithes into the storehouse, that there may be meat in mine house, and prove me now herewith, saith the LORD of hosts, if I will not open you the windows of heaven, and pour you out a blessing, that there shall not be room enough to receive it. And I will rebuke the devourer for your sakes, and he shall not destroy the fruits of your ground; neither shall your vine cast her fruit before the time in the field, saith the LORD of hosts. And all nations shall call you blessed: for ye shall be a delightsome land, saith the LORD of hosts. ”
Also in Psalms (112:1-3) we read: "Praise ye the LORD. Blessed is the man that feareth the LORD, that delighteth greatly in his commandments. His seed shall be mighty upon earth: the generation of the upright shall be blessed. Wealth and riches shall be in his house: and his righteousness endureth forever."
It is not therefore wrong for somebody to have possessions. Job was the wealthiest man of the East but his wealth was not his joy! He didn’t put his trust in wealth.  Job’s trust was in God. Job’s security was not in the big property, but God. Not the gold, but the Lord. That’s why he reacted the way he did when he lost everything: “God gave it, God took it”.
An opposite example, an example of man that put his trust on money, we find in today’s Gospel. “And one of the company said unto him, Master, speak to my brother, that he divide the inheritance with me. And he said unto him, Man, who made me a judge or a divider over you? And Jesus said a parable unto them. We have listened to the parable in the Gospel.
 Both the man of the parable and Job were rich men. But this is their only similarity. While Job’s joy was not dependent on his wealth, and his gold was not his confidence, this man here is the exact opposite. He is the picture of a worldly wealthy man.
The ground brought to him so much that he didn’t know where to put all this. So here is what he decided: “And he said, this will I do: I will pull down my barns, and build greater; and there will I bestow all my fruits and my goods. And I will say to my soul, Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for many years; take thine ease, eat, drink, and be merry”. It was not the plenty that was bad.  Wealth came to him. This by itself was not a problem. The problem with this man was his reaction towards this. He failed to recognize the provider of the good crop. He failed to give glory to the owner of everything. Instead he considered everything as belonging to him. This was his folly.
Unfortunately many of us have been grown with worldly standards of success and these standards more often measure success with how much we earn and how much we have.
But there are occasions we become helpless. The Earthquake and Tsunami in Indonesia last year killed about 2800 people, levelled entire cities and rendered more than 330000 people homeless. The monsoon flood in Kerala killed about 300 people and the estimated Property damage was about ₹400 billion (US$5.8 billion). Floods in Nigeria claimed 200 lives, destroyed more than 13,000 homes and affected nearly 2 million people. These are just a few of the many great natural disasters happened last year.
While these tragedies have destroyed homes and lives, they have also created heroes. Everyday men, women and even children risked their lives to save others, donated aid when they had little to give and helped rebuild their communities from scratch. Dear brothers and sisters it shows that everything is good and meaningful with God. And they become vanity without God.

In 2009, as rains engulfed Manila, sweeping away homes and villagers, the 18-year-old construction worker, Muelmar Magallanes, jumped to action, moving his family to higher ground. But his bravery didn't stop there. Muelmar went back to swim through the floods and pull 30 of his neighbors to safety. After pushing a mother and infant to shore on a makeshift raft made of Styrofoam, the exhausted hero was lost in the water, his body discovered the next day. "He gave his life for my baby," Menchie Penalosa, the child's mother, told the UK's Daily Mail. "I will never forget his sacrifice." He has made his life meaningful with his action. At the end of our life too at least one should be able to say that “I will never forget him/her.” We should realize that the ultimate purpose of our education, talent and possession is to leave behind a foot print in the life of at least one person. That is the real wealth.
Satish