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Homily
Fr. Paul Ward
Sat. & Sun., Jul. 30 & 31,
2016
18th Sunday in
Ord. Time, C
Social Doctrine (1/7):
Avarice, Wealth and the
Purpose of Material Things
1.
Today we shall begin
a small series of seven
homilies, from now until
November, during which
we shall study Catholic
Social Teaching, as I
explained last week.
They won’t come in seven
Sundays in a row, but
will be spread out a
bit, as there are other
important things about
which I need to preach.
Each homily will examine
one of the seven capital
sins, describe its
manifestations in
society, and demonstrate
how the Church’s social
teaching provides light,
hope and freedom from
these sins. Today we
start with the capital
sin of greed.
First, a couple
details about parish
life. I want to again
thank our donors, and
encourage more
households to
participate, in our
capital campaign. If our
contractor stays on
schedule, in late August
our urgent work on the
roof will get underway –
thanks to your generous
donations! Please keep
Sept. 11 on your
schedule, a Sunday when
we will have our parish
picnic. We’ll have the
usual games for kids, I
invite groups to put out
displays of what they
do. One parishioner
wants to organize a
one-day “Pre-Vatican II
museum,” inviting those
who might have items or
prayer books from those
days to put them on
display for everyone’s
cultural and historical
enrichment. We’re also
organizing a tournament
of soccer, where teams,
5-on-5 can compete, so
please start organizing
your friends now. These
and more things are
planned. It will be a
very enjoyable day, and
an opportunity to build
up our friendships as
parishioners.
Now to today’s topic.
Let us see how greed,
or, more precisely,
avarice impacts our
society, and how the
Church shows us all a
way out. We begin with
the very notion of
avarice. Avarice is a
disordered desire for
any good. Sometimes this
inordinate desire is for
money, specifically, but
it can apply more
generally to anything
that a man may possess.
One who steals money
from others suffers from
avarice, but also one
who steals clothing or
even toys from siblings,
or tools from a
neighbor’s garage. One
can also desire to
possess intangible
things, meaning, things
that aren’t physical and
perceptible to the
senses. For example,
when one is overanxious
for popularity, while
that is also vainglory,
a different capital sin,
it is in part avarice;
or, more importantly,
when a man pants for
power over his neighbor,
that too falls under
avarice.
This individual moral
failing can have
consequences in the
public square.
Politicians are
especially exposed to
this vice, when they
have a disordered desire
or enjoyment of power of
their fellow citizens,
or they tax excessively,
or when they steal,
embezzle or otherwise
abuse of public funds.
There is no limit to how
many sins of those in
power could be
enumerated on account of
greed. God sees all of
these sins in all their
truth, and the
politician will answer
for such things at his
last judgment. If he
sins, he needs to
repent, confess to the
priests of the Church,
and restore what was
stolen, or whatever else
damage he did.
Others besides
politicians can fall
into this sin. Pop
singers can invoke
demons to make their
music more lucrative;
beautiful women movie
stars can compromise
their own dignity,
exposing themselves, out
of desire for money;
people lie about
products they sell;
pebbles are added to
crop products to
increase weight;
everyone from human
traffickers to cable
television providers
sell the human body for
profit, and at such
human cost!
In the Church’s
social teachings,
“economic goods and
riches are not in
themselves condemned, so
much as their misuse.”
For man needs money, and
honestly earned profit
is conducive not only to
his material prosperity
in this life, but also
that of his family, and
it puts him in a
position to help the
poor. By supporting
himself, but also his
family, his church, his
favorite charities,
different groups to
which he belongs, he
shares his wealth in a
way well governed by
right reason. The proper
use of money gives man
an opportunity to
acquire peace, culture,
and virtues like charity
and justice. And the
Church officially
defends the existence
and operation of the
free market
and private property
– against socialism – as
institutions that
guarantee honest
production of wealth in
goods and services, not
only for individuals,
but for all.
Wealth therefore is
seen as a means, and
never and end. It is a
means for a man’s
individual good, and
also for the common good
of particular groups or
of the whole world.
Wealth belongs to a
person, not to a
government; for which,
it is the person who has
obligations of payment
to services he receives
from his city and state,
yet it is not the right
of a government to take
whatsoever amount a
given politician demands
for his own greedy
purposes. No state or
politician, therefore,
has a blank check, nor
is it the privilege of
the state or a
politician to dispose of
all of the property of
any single person.
The Church sees that
all God has made in the
material universe is to
benefit all men, and
that private property is
the necessary regulating
means for this benefit
to come about.
Let each man, therefore,
seek honest wealth, not
out of love for money,
but out of a well
ordered love for his own
physical and spiritual
good, and out of a love
for one’s neighbor whom
he may serve with
generosity and joy. The
avarice of individuals
tends to precipitate the
world into the most
horrendous conflicts and
abuses that afflict us
all; yet if we could all
be detached from money,
generous with our
neighbor, and spiritual
in our aspirations,
great peace and justice
would arise, all of
which can happen only
through God’s grace, and
yet would lead many to
great heights of
holiness.
Every worldly thing
is a passing thing, a
vanity. “Vanity of
vanities, says Qoheleth,
vanity of vanities! All
things are vanity!” (Ecc.
1:2) And as our Lord
admonishes us in today’s
Gospel, “Take care to
guard against all greed”
(Lk 12:15). We ask this
and every grace through
Mary’s intercession.
Amen. ■
Social Doctrine
Homilies
Compendium of
Social Doctrine
of the Church,
from the
Pontifical
Council for
Justice and
Peace, Librevia
Editrice
Vaticana
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