18th Week of Ordinary Time
Ecclesiastes 1:2; 2:21–23
Psalm 90:3–4, 5–6, 12–13, 14, 17
Colossians 3:1–5, 9–11
Luke 12:13–21
Our generation of humanity might someday be known for one “heresy” in particular: the mistaken belief that we know better than any other generation that has come before us.
Ancient Greek tragedies highlighted the drama caused by hubris, that is, the self-destructive pride of the hero. Achilles’ heel, the blindness of Oedipus and the self-aggrandizing bravado of so many leaders led to the downfall of empires and the victories of enemies. We fall into the same trap when we buy the lie of our that we must listen only to the “spirit of the age” to find what is “true.”
Qoheleth, presented in the image of the wise King Solomon, offers the antidote to this heresy: acknowledgement of “vanity.” All that is, everything we experience in this life is a puff of smoke, a chasing after of the wind. Acknowledging this, we can discover what truly endures.
Jesus, asked to settle a dispute about the share of an “inheritance,” tells the parable of the rich man with a bountiful harvest. Death comes for this man who has built up a treasury of earthly goods. His life is demanded of him. He is chided: “… and the things you have prepared, to whom will they belong?”
When we think of success only in worldly terms, we are forgetting the bigger picture. God has a plan of relationship for all that includes time and eternity. Our life is a search for the meaning of this relationship.
The effort to discern the truth has seemingly disappeared in our time. Qoheleth provides a model worth imitating. He reviews every human experience. He looks to what has happened to him and to what others have discovered as the consequences of their actions.
The truth reveals itself when we strip away non-essentials. When truth is discovered, then a solid foundation reveals what will last. In the Gospel, Jesus points to what lasts: the treasure of “what matters to God.” To find and become rich in this treasure, we must set our sights on what God values.
St. Paul tells us that we are destined for glory and that we will find the truth of ourselves in Christ, not in what we might find here below. This is a radical claim. “If you were raised with Christ, seek what is above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. Think of what is above, not of what is on earth. For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.”
He offers us a promise that of something beyond what earth can give us: “When Christ your life appears, then you too will appear with him in glory.”
The Responsorial Psalm invites us to listen for the voice of God. “If today you hear his voice, harden not your hearts.”
This voice will speak to us if we are willing to listen. First, it calls us to realize that “what is below” does not satisfy. When we experience the limitations of the world around us, we are beginning to hear the invitation to seek something more, something higher. Then, the voice of God calls us to choose not to stay wrapped in the self-understanding that this world has presented to us.
When we decide to put relationship with God in the first place, we become free to see the world for what it is. All our experiences of earthly things are “vanity.” But there is a promise of glory that speaks to our hearts.
Jesus Christ presents a way of truth very different from the world. He acknowledges the goodness of the world as God’s creation. He embraces it. But He also accepts the limitations, always calling His disciples to build up a treasure that is beyond this world.
We are in the world, but we belong to something beyond the world. When we enter into a real relationship with Jesus, we are called into His way of living, and we discover the deepest truth: the hope of glory. “If today you hear his voice, harden not your hearts.”