Charity as an Antidote to Greed!

Monday, October 23, 2023

Rom 4:20-25; Lk 12:13-21

In today’s gospel, Jesus teaches the parable of the rich fool to warn against greed. 

At least in three ways, we find the rich man greedy.

1.His self-talk reveals how greedy he is. His self-centeredness is revealed through words like ‘I’ (6 times), ‘my’ (3 times), and ‘you’ in reference to himself (twice). All these eleven references to himself are made in just four verses (17-20). His inordinate obsession with himself manifests his greed. 

2. The rich man has been blessed by God. But he seems to deny it in his behaviour. The idea to enlarge his barns arises out of such denial of the Divine Providence. He refuses to take trust in the fact that God’s providence will continue in the future just as he finds it in the present. His greed blinds him to the fact of Divine Care.

3. The rich man comes across as someone deeply engrossed in this world. He behaves as if he were immortal. His obsession with this world prevents him from seeing the other world. In his greed, he does not see beyond himself and this world. His greed arrests his moral and spiritual imagination. 

Because of all these reasons, Jesus names him the ‘rich fool.’

Jesus wants us to guard against greed and to find joy in sharing with others what we have received in abundance. 

Fr. Dhinakaran Savariyar