Word to the Wise
Friday, June 20, 2025 - Friday in the 11th Week in Ordinary Time
[2 Cor 11:18, 21-30 and Matt 6:19-23]"Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and decay destroy, and thieves break in and steal. But store up treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor decay destroys, nor thieves break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there also will your heart be." [Matthew]
"For where your treasure is, there also will your heart be!" I know I have told this story before, but it illustrates Jesus' line so well that I have to repeat it when I read the line. Years ago, when I was director of the Catholic student center at the University of Arizona (1977-80), we celebrated a retreat in which we gave each of the student participants 15 slips of paper. They were to write down their five most important activities, their five most important possessions and the five most important relationships in their lives. They were to list them in order of importance. When that was completed, they were asked to start crumpling the slips, beginning with the least important, and to throw them into the center of the circle of the gathering. In a sense, it was a challenge to discover where their true treasure was. The emotional atmosphere was strong - male and female - and students went from the exercise to the chapel to sit and think about the decisions they had made. They learned where their hearts were.
"Treasure in heaven" seems to many to be too much of a "pie in the sky, by and by." But Jesus was also preaching a new "Kingdom of Heaven" that could be present now if we only make the effort to bring it about. It can happen in many ways, large and small. The parable of the last judgment in Matthew 25:31-45 gives examples. The Sermon on the Mount, where we read today's teaching, speaks of love of neighbor - even of one's enemy! The beauty of friendship is another example. It is not a matter of earning "brownie points," but of accepting Jesus' challenge to discover and to live the command to love now and not simply to earn a place in heaven. Our "treasure" is often "hidden" simply because we don't want to make the effort to look for it. AMEN