“What you have accumulated, who will have it?” (Lk 12, 13-21) | RCF

Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Luke

During that time,
from the middle of the crowd, someone asked Jesus:
“Master, tell my brother
to share our heritage with me. »
Jesus answered him:
“Man, who established me
to be your judge or the arbiter of your shares? »
Then, addressing everyone:
“Beware of all greed,
because someone’s life,
even in abundance,
does not depend on what he has. »
And he told them this parable:
“There was a rich man,
whose estate had paid well.
He was wondering :
“What will I do ?
Because I have no place to put my harvest.”
Then he says to himself:
“Here’s what I’m going to do:
I will demolish my attics,
I will build bigger ones
and I will put all my grain and all my goods into it.
So I’ll say to myself:
So here you are with many goods at your disposal,
for many years.
Rest, eat, drink, enjoy life.”
But God said to him:
“You are crazy :
this very night, you will be asked for your life.
And what you will have accumulated,
who will have it?”
This is what happens to him who lays up for himself,
instead of being rich in the sight of God. »

Source: AELF

Meditation Father Michel Quesnel

This Gospel page is not unrelated to that of yesterday. The dialogue between Jesus and the man who asks him to convince his brother to share their inheritance with him shows that we sometimes ask in prayer for illegitimate advantages. God is not interested in money. Jesus has no desire to favor financial bonuses. The man is sent back to his goals.

The following parable shows the danger of riches. Having great possessions is reassuring. The rich man that Jesus depicts had already amassed a lot. As his possessions had yielded a lot, he now had too much.

What to do when we have too much? The best thing is to share with those who are in need. But the man in question has no thought of sharing. The mass of his possessions was already large. She got too big. His only perspective is to build larger containers to accommodate content that has become too large. Sitting on a pile of gold may seem reassuring.

But it is an illusion. What we have amassed in this world will no longer belong to us in the hereafter. “Shrouds have no pockets”, goes a popular proverb.

There are, however, other riches, those which Jesus calls “to be rich in the sight of God”. It is up to us to make them prosper, and to help our brothers to do the same. In a book devoted to Abbé Pierre, the author invites his readers to (I quote) “make it easier for those who are suffocating to breathe, and stop the hum of satisfaction”.

Help us, Lord, to take advantage of it: let us not be complacent purrs. And let us also facilitate the breathing of those who are suffocating.