Sunday Reflections

On first reading, the gospel this Sunday has always puzzled me.  Is Jesus really praising dishonesty? The commentators say that what the fired steward was doing was not actually dishonest; he was simply reducing the cut of the debt that would have come to him, his commission. The whole point of the story is to use wisely the gifts we have been given. After I almost died in April from a buildup of toxicity, that is precisely what came to my mind.  The fact that I continued to live meant that God gave me an extension of life to use the gifts I have been given. It was not a call for me simply to drift to the end of my life.

Sometimes I think of life as an old-fashioned hourglass which is full of sand at the top, trickling slowly to the bottom section. The sand is the life that God has given us. It is full of all of our talents, gifts, strengths, and weaknesses. As we watch the sand slowly trickle down, we realize that there is a time limit; there is only so much sand in the top. The challenge is to use those gifts before they run out. Procrastination is not on the menu. If we think something needs to be done, we need to do it.

As St. Teresa of Avila says:

Christ has no body but yours,
No hands, no feet on earth but yours,
Yours are the eyes with which he looks with
Compassion on this world,
Yours are the feet with which he walks to do good,
Yours are the hands, with which he blesses all the world.
Yours are the hands, yours are the feet,
Yours are the eyes, you are his body.
Christ has no body now but yours.

Yes, this is the sand we have been blessed with. We are called to be wise and shrewd in using it for the sake of those in need around us. Time is running out, we need to get moving.