33rd Sunday Year A 2014
Homily
Nov 14,2014
Mt 25: 14-30 The Parable of Talents
A doctor, a lawyer, a young boy and a priest were out for a
Sunday afternoon flight on a small private plane. All of a sudden, the plane
developed engine trouble. In spite of the best effort of the pilot, the plane
started to go down.
Realizing the situation very dangerous, the pilot grabbed a
parachute and yelled to the passengers that they had better jump, and then he
bailed out.
Unfortunately there were only three parachutes. The doctor
grabbed one of them and said, “I am a
doctor. I save lives. So I must live.” Then he jumped.
The lawyer then said, “I am a lawyer. We are the smartest
people in the world. So I deserve to live. Then he grabbed a parachute and jumped.
The priest looked at the little boy and said, “my son, I
have lived a long full life. You are so young and you deserve to live. Take the
last parachute and live in peace.
The little boy handed the parachute back to the priest and
said, “Not to worry, father, the smartest man in the world just took off with
my back pack.
How smart are we in our spiritual life? In other words, how
smart are we in in terms of our eternity?
The parable throws light on the very nature of God. God is a
risk taker. God risked his only son on a cross. The risky nature of God is
revealed in the parable of the sower. He
scatters the seed all over the place indiscriminately by the way side, in the bushes and on the rock.
God is not calculative in his actions. God also is very generous. He invests heavily in his three
servants. He trusts them. He loves them.
The parable also throws light on our attitude toward God. Those three servants are us. Two of the servants are proactive. They know they are supposed to
take risk like their master.
This parable reminds us that the greatest gift that God has ever given to us is our human life. We human beings are the peak of living
organisms. It is the greatest gift that
we have ever received from God. God wants us to cherish that life to the fullest.
God wants us to use that life to uplift other people.
What this life is for? This life is to be expended to have
more life. The parable of the seed expounds this principle in a vivid way! A
grain of wheat is very tiny. If it chooses to remain in a shelf, it is good for
nothing. It remains just as a tiny seed. On the other hand, if it falls on the
ground, it loses its identity, and sprouts up and produces hundreds of grain of
wheat.
Look around to see the greatest things that happened in the world because of the life expended by Jesus on a cross.
We know how the world has dramatically changed over the last couple of centuries because of
the lives expended by Mother Theresa, Mahatma Gandhi, Martin Luther King, and
Bishop Romero.The world has never been the same. Our life well cherished and expended produces much fruit.
On the other hand, we see the opposite in the third steward who refused to take the risk. How would you characterize the steward? I would say he is very sour, angry, afraid, toxic, blaming, grouchy,bitter,complaining, grumpy and negative. Poor man! he is very miserable. He blames everybody, even God.
On the other hand, we see the opposite in the third steward who refused to take the risk. How would you characterize the steward? I would say he is very sour, angry, afraid, toxic, blaming, grouchy,bitter,complaining, grumpy and negative. Poor man! he is very miserable. He blames everybody, even God.
He digs a big hole and buries his life in it. We love such people as God loves them,
but we don’t want to be around them because they are very toxic.
Jesus told this parable in the context of his second coming.
We do not know when the world is going to end. There are so many self proclaimed false prophets who claim it would happen tomorrow. Nobdy knows when the world is coming to an end. However, we know for sure that the world will
come to an end to every one of us when the physical death happens to us.
The servants might even represent the potential actions of the Church. Having received the divine gift, does the Church seek to increase her membership and influence others (evangelism), or does she hold herself in reserve, not wishing to take any risks, satisfied with the way it has always been? For something to be called “alive”, it has as one of its properties the idea of growth. The cells or constituents of the living thing are able to divide or reproduce to generate more of the living thing. The living thing produces more from the basic gifts (or talents) that it has been given. In much the same way, the Church is “alive” and grows when reaching out in evangelism and gains new members, influences those outside the Church, or causes its own members to increase their faith, thereby being worthy of receiving even more divine gifts from the Divine Master.
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