With Opened Bible

“You cannot serve both God and mammon."

Money is a good servant but a bad master. That is what this Sunday's Gospel aims to teach us. In the first reading, the prophet Amos, a champion of social justice, describes the injustice of his time and the underlying malfeasance. Social justice, as Amos understood it, is the fair and just distribution of wealth, opportunities, and privileges within a society. For gain, people will do anything, even defying the Law of the Lord, to satisfy their desires. "You who trample upon the needy and destroy the poor of the land! We will buy the lowly for silver, and the poor for a pair of sandals; even the refuse of the wheat we will sell!" (Amos 8) The poor, the needy, and the orphan are often despised for the sake of money and profit.

Thus, the Gospel of Jesus Christ sounds the alarm to enlighten hearts and minds. No servant can serve two masters. He will either hate one and love the other or be devoted to one and despise the other. "You cannot serve both God and mammon." (Saint Luke 16:12-13) But the big queston we must ask ourselves is this: What is the meaning of mammon? The word "mammon" is an Aramaic derivatve meaning material wealth, or in other words, money. This word is negatvely associated with the human desire to possess everything. In short, with greed. (Cf. Mathew 6:24; Luke 16:9, 11, 13) Mammon becomes, by extension, the God of those who live only for money and riches. They think, live, and breathe only for that. Jesus warned his disciples against this attitude, which kills their humanity by transforming them into executioners for others.

The situation has not changed. Our world is living through similar times since money, power, and wealth are the only factors that define Man. Human worth depends on what he has and possesses. Saint Paul understood this well when he wrote to his spiritual son Timothy: "Those who want to be rich are falling into temptation and into a trap and into many foolish and harmful desires, which plunge them into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is the root of all evil, and some people in their desire for it have strayed from the faith and have pierced themselves with many wounds." (1 Timothy 6:9-10) This is a cautonary tale, a warning against the love of money. Let us be mindful of this and be good stewards of the riches of the earth so that God may entrust us with eternal riches.