Rich Toward God

Homily for Sunday, August 3, 2025
The Eighth Sunday After Pentecost
Luke 12:13-21

Canadian literary critic Northrup Frye held that in the West all literature has an antecedent in scripture. And so, for example, Oliver Twist could be understood as the story of the Good Samaritan: Oliver is the traveler who fell into the hands of robbers; Fagin, Bill Sykes and Nancy are those who pass by without helping, and Mr. Brownlow is the Good Samaritan who stops and aids Oliver.  Or Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath could be understood as the Exodus: Oklahoma is Egypt and California the Promised Land; Highway 66 is the way through the wilderness, and Tom Joad is a kind of Moses.  Or again, Dostoyevsky’s Crime and Punishment could be understood as a retelling of the Gospel of John with its underlying framework of atonement:  Raskolnikov is the sinner in need of redemption; Sonya – the prostitute who is in a way an “apostle” to Raskolnikov – [Sonya] is Mary Magdalene; and the wise and good-hearted Petrovich is the judge who in the end effects Raskolnikov’s redemption.  According to Northrup Frye, in the West all literature has an antecedent in scripture.

In today’s Gospel lesson Jesus tells the so-called “Parable of the Rich Fool. “The land of a rich man produced abundantly,” Jesus said.

And [the man] thought to himself…  “I will do this:  I will… build larger [barns] and there I will store all my grain and my goods…”  But God said to him, “You fool!  This very night your life is being demanded of you. And the things you have prepared, whose will they be?”

Though this parable probably has inspired multiple works of literature in the West, there is one in particular that comes to mind.  Hint: It is 19^th century English… It’s about a wealthy banker… [As needed: It’s set at Christmas time…  It also is by Dickens.]  A Christmas Carol!  Scrooge is the rich man, who is visited by the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come and shown a vision of his own death, which begs the question (as in today’s Gospel lesson):  “All these things you have stored up…  Whose will they be?”

We know how the story ends: Scrooge awakes from the vision, grateful to be alive and intent on reform.  He sends a large turkey to the Cratchit family, goes to his nephew Fred’s Christmas party, takes Tiny Tim under his wing, and uses his wealth to provide for the poor.  

The lesson in today’s Gospel is clear.  Jesus says: “So it is with those who store up treasures for themselves but are not rich toward God.”  

Three things about the Parable of the Rich Fool:  1)  We will all die.  2) Jesus does not condemn wealth generally.  3)  Instead of “storing up treasures for ourselves,” the parable urges us to be “rich toward God.”

First, we will all die. It may seem obvious that, “we will all die,” but also obvious is that many don’t think about death.  How many of us, for example, do not have a will? Or how many of us have not made funeral plans, or spoken to our family or friends as to how they might get on without us, or completed a Durable Power of Attorney for Health Care?  Though it is clear that we will all die, it is also clear that many of us don’t think about death.  And so it is that we, like the rich fool of the parable (or like Scrooge) can fall into the trap of spending our life’s energies storing up “treasures” that we cannot take with us when we are gone.

Second, Jesus does not condemn wealth generally.  Note that in the parable Jesus does not say that wealth and money are bad.  Indeed, nowhere in scripture does it say that money and wealth are bad.  The First Letter of Paul to Timothy says that, “The love of money is a root of all kinds of evil,” (6:10); and the Letter to the Hebrews urges us to, “Keep your lives free from the love of money” (13:5).  But nowhere do the scriptures say that money itself is bad. It is not money but our attitude toward money that can harm us.  As the Letter to Timothy continues:  “Those who want to be rich fall into temptations and are trapped by many senseless and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction” (1 Tim 6:9); and again, “In their eagerness to become rich some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pains” (1 Tim 6:10).  As with the wealthy man in the parable and as with Scrooge, it is not money but the love of money that can harm us.  

Lastly, instead of “storing up treasures for ourselves,” the parable urges us to be “rich toward God.” Twentieth-century Catholic social teaching has a different perspective on wealth than does the wider culture. If we “own” anything, says Catholic social teaching, it is because God has temporarily given us these things to hold in order that we may use them for the common good. If we have income beyond what we need “to sustain life fittingly and with dignity” – and here I am quoting Pope Pius XI (from1931 (Quadregesimo anno, 50)) – the use of our surplus “is not left wholly to our own free determination.  Rather the Scriptures and the Fathers of the Church constantly declare in the most explicit language that the rich are bound by a very grave precept to practice alms giving, beneficence, and munificence.”

The issue with the rich fool of the parable – and the issue with Scrooge before his visit from the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come – [the issue] is not that they are rich, for there is nothing bad about money.  Their issue is that they are storing up treasures for themselves and are not “rich toward God.”  They are hindered by their desire for profit; they do not recognize that their wealth is a gift; they fail to see their interdependence with others and that we all bear a responsibility for all; and they refuse to commit to the common good by caring for those less fortunate.

I’m going to leave us with a quote from another Pope, Pope Francis, and then also a quote from a Lutheran pastor in Wisconsin.

First, Pope Francis. Speaking about how neither the desire for material goods nor their possession guarantees a fulfilled human life, Pope Francis said:

Avarice is the first step:  it opens the door to vanity, to seeing oneself as important and powerful, and then to pride.  And from there come all the vices, all of them.  But the first step is avarice, the desire to accumulate riches.  This is precisely where our daily struggle should be:  learning how to administer the riches of the earth properly so that they… are converted into riches of heaven. 

Lastly, Pastor Niveen Sarras, of Immanuel Lutheran Church in Oconomowoc, Wisconsin:

Greed is the moral antithesis of generosity.  It makes us worry about the future instead of trusting God, who holds the future.  Greed destroys us, but generosity blesses us…All our possessions are God’s gift to us, and as Christian stewards, God calls us to share our gifts with those in need. 

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