Set Your Mind on Things Above

08-03-2025Weekly ReflectionFr. Albert

In today's Gospel we see that when it comes to possessions even the best of people often end up losing their heads and become blind and deaf. they see only their interest and are willing to override even the most sacred sentiments. At times, with the help of a wise friend, the parties are able to agree, at other times instead the hatred lasts for years and the brothers stop talking to each other. Jesus was chosen as a mediator to solve one of these family contrasts. The situation presented to him has arisen because one has attempted to commit an injustice and the other is in danger of suffering it.

What to do? Various solutions can be taken? invent an excuse to escape the complicated issue, or reply upon the provisions in force that, in the time of Jesus, are those set forth. The section of Deuteronomy does give a solution to the problem but does not eliminate the cause from which all the discord, hatred and injustice are derived.

Instead of solving the individual case, Jesus chooses to go to the root of the problem. ''Be on your guard - he tells everyone and avoid every kind of greed, for even though you have many possessions, it is not that which gives you life''. Here the cause of all evil is singled out, the greed of money, the desire to grab things. Disagreement arises always when one forgets basic truth, the goods of this world do not belong to us but to God, who allocates them to all.

Anyone who hoards for oneself grabs more than he or she should, without thinking of others, distorts the Creator's plan. the goods are no longer considered as gifts of God, To clarify his thought he tells a parable, the central part of which consists of the long argument that the rich farmer does with himself. Why is this man called foolish? listening to this man one cannot but wonder does he have no family, wife, and children? No neighbors? No workers? he has them. He lives among the people, but he does not see them. He has no time, no energies to use, no thoughts, no words, and no feelings, for the people. He is only interested in on who speaks of property and suggests how to increase them.

He thinks of the crops, the stores, and the wheat. In his mind there is no room for anything else, certainly not for God. The asserts are the idol that has created a vacuum around him and has dehumanized all. Even the farmer, in his heart, is no longer a man, he is a thing, he is a machine that produces and makes calculations.

Today's message rests on the fact that possessions have the potential have the potential to blind us to the existence of God and others and in that sense as we see in the first reading everything is vanity, which according to St. Paul can be reminded by ''Setting your mind on things that are above, not on earthly things and according to Jesus teaching the greatest possession one can have is that what makes one rich in the sight of God. We can only achieve this richness in the eyes of God if we always remember that all possessions belong to God just as every created being belongs to Him.