November 6, 2009
Friday of the Thirty-first Week in Ordinary Time
By Melanie Rigney
I myself am convinced about you, my brothers and sisters, that you yourselves are full of goodness, filled with all knowledge, and able to admonish one another. (Romans 15:14)
Shout with joy to the Lord, all the earth; break into song; sing praise. (Psalms 98:4)
Jesus said to his disciples, “A rich man had a steward who was reported to him for squandering his property. He summoned him and said, ‘What is this I hear about you? Prepare a full account of your stewardship, because you can no longer be my steward.’ The steward said to himself, ‘What shall I do, now that my master is taking the position of steward away from me? I am not strong enough to dig and I am ashamed to beg. I know what I shall do so that, when I am removed from the stewardship, they may welcome me into their homes.’ He called in his master’s debtors one by one. To the first he said, ‘How much do you owe my master?’ He replied, ‘One hundred measures of olive oil.’ He said to him, ‘Here is your promissory note. Sit down and quickly write one for fifty.’ Then to another he said, ‘And you, how much do you owe?’ He replied, ‘One hundred measures of wheat.’ He said to him, ‘Here is your promissory note; write one for eighty.’ And the master commended that dishonest steward for acting prudently. For the children of this world are more prudent in dealing with their own generation than the children of light.” (Luke 16:1-8)
Piety
Lord, I let you down so often. Your willingness to forgive me encourages me to keep trying anew to live a Christlike life. Help me to show the same forgiveness to my family, friends, coworkers, and others you put in my path each day.
Study
Being caught in a mistake is hard. It doesn’t matter whether it’s something as simple as leaving the lights on and squandering electricity… or playing fast and loose with someone else’s money as an investor. Sometimes, God is the easiest one to square things with… the harder part is living with the people who know we messed up.
The reaction of the steward in today’s Gospel reading seems calculating to us at first. He’s not provided the requisite return on investment and is going to lose his job. And so, “not strong enough to dig and … ashamed to beg,” he looks for a way to be in the good graces of the debtors. He tells them to rewrite their chits for the amount owed the master, forgiving the steward’s own commission. The master then commends the steward’s prudence. “The parable, then, teaches the prudent use of one’s material goods in light of an imminent crisis,” the New American Bible tells us in notes on this reading.
Maybe this parable teaches us something else. We’re going to mess up. We’re only human. We succeed… and we fail. And when those failures involve taking advantage of our brothers and sisters, it’s best to take some initiative and remediate the actions as best we can. Sometimes, it’s returning earthly goods. Sometimes, it’s acknowledging the hurt we have created and asking forgiveness. But if we are confident in God’s forgiveness, is it not also prudent to redress our wrongs with the Christ we see in each other?
In a different context, Paul shares a new view of humanity: “I myself am convinced about you, my brothers and sisters, that you yourselves are full of goodness, filled with all knowledge, and able to admonish one another.” Let us trust in the goodness of others and approach them with the same contrition we do God when we have wronged them.
Action
Make a mistake right with someone you’ve been avoiding. Or, grant forgiveness to someone who’s wronged you.
