So our Lord speaks against selfishness and a lack of trust in the providence of God that
we need to invest, we need to store up so much for the future for ourselves, and then
we don't know what the future is going to hold.
And so there's this kind of selfishness, this lack of trust in God who is going to provide
for us in the future, and stinginess, hoarding that we can do at times because we don't
think we might have enough in the future, the lack of trust in the providence of God.
But one good way to counteract that is to practice the virtue of generosity.
If we are generous, God is always going to be there for us.
He will not be outdone in generosity.
And we were reading in some of the readings from last week in the Gospel of how in the
Old Testament when the Jews were exiled.
They were exiled in Babylon and they came back, they were sent back to Jerusalem to
rebuild their temple by the king, Cyrus, and then King Darius.
That the people didn't, they started and then they didn't continue, and then they were busy
building their own homes and being comfortable and settling in, and they forgot about the
house of God, and so they didn't continue to rebuild the temple, and God was hurt by
that.
And he said through the prophet Zechariah that if you don't build my house, I'm not
going to prosper your crops and your house and the things that you do.
He's not going to bless it, and he didn't.
And they would work hard to build up their crops and their cattle and find that there
were blights and droughts, and they didn't reap a good harvest.
They didn't reap a good harvest at all.
And he said the reason why was because you were selfish.
You didn't put me first.
God comes first.
And so they didn't trust in God's providence, and they didn't build his temple.
They didn't love God first.
They loved themselves.
But it's when we are generous in putting God first and spending our time for him and seeing
him in our neighbor and helping our neighbor and giving alms and being generous with our
possessions and generous in our time, that's when God provides.
That's when we have more than we would otherwise, and that's supernatural faith, and that's
what we should have.
We should have this spirit of generosity, and that can characterize our Christian life.
We can think of our...
Catholic life as fulfilling the commandments and the rules of the church and the rules
of God, and think of it as sort of a drudgery, maybe.
I've got all these things to fulfill or else.
But the saints didn't think that way.
It looked like St. Therese, for example.
She was always trying to do more for God, to offer him many things, to offer him many
tokens of her love.
And she knew.
She always thought of God.
She thought of God as a loving father who was very generous and who would always provide
for her.
And one time she listened to a sermon by a priest who talked about the justice of God
and the fear that we should have of his punishments for our sin.
And she went away discouraged and confused and didn't draw any fruit from the sermon
because her spirituality was based on generosity.
And she thought of God as a loving father who would always give his life for His sake.
And she lived one life.
She lived one life.
She lived one life.
So, I think It's important to give everything for God's sake.
And I think it's absolutely important that we do this.
Because God is so generous.
And the love of God which is generous.
God's love is enormously generous in this life.
But especially in the next and the promises that we have of eternal life, there's generosity
to the ultimate extreme of what God has prepared for those who love him.
God is generous.
He's infinitely powerful, and why not?
So, we too need to be generous.
And we can be more and more generous than anyone.
We can be more and more generous than anyone.
And we can be more and more generous than anyone.
And we can be more and more generous than anyone.
the more we know that God is behind us
in going to prosper what we do
and what we give to our neighbor.
This is the mentality of all the saints.
Saint Maximilian would always talk about
the greatest possible glory of God
that we need to provide
without any limitations,
without any reservations
that we should give to God,
give to Our Lady in our consecration.
And he always would stretch, press,
what do they call it,
push the envelope
and put as much in there as you can.
Always try to expand.
And he wanted to bring Our Lady to every heart,
to the greatest possible number of people.
And that's why he had this idea
of always promoting devotion to Our Lady
because it is through Our Lady
that we can do the most for God.
That we can reach the most people.
We can reach the greatest salvation of souls
through Our Lady
because that's the plan of God
that Our Lady will produce the most for us
because it requires certain humility
and docility in our mother's hands.
And so he would talk about
the greatest possible glory of God
and he'd talk about the mass media,
using the mass media to reach as many people
as we possibly can
to do as much as we possibly can for souls.
And we need to be generous.
You can think of St. Mary Magdalene too
when she took that very costly ointment
and broke it,
broke the jar
and poured it over the head and feet of Our Lord.
And the apostles were complaining
that that could have been spent on,
sold and a lot of money
could have been given to the poor.
But Our Lord said,
no, what she did will be remembered
for till the end of the world.
And we do remember it in the gospel readings.
But Judas said that that was a waste.
We don't waste things
if we're doing it for God
and for our neighbor.
In one of my previous assignments,
we were celebrating the Corpus Christi
and we would purchase a lot of flowers
and the sisters,
we would adorn the church
with very beautiful, elaborate flower decorations
which would last a couple of weeks.
And it used to be more in the cold climate
that I was in there.
And so they would last two or three weeks,
four weeks sometimes.
And so we got our money's worth, so to speak.
But it cost a lot of money to get all the flowers
and put all the decorations
and it took a lot of work.
And there were certain complaints
that were aired that I heard afterwards.
And one of the lay people
were trying to collect donations
to pay for the flowers,
which was about maybe $1,300
for all the flowers that we purchased
for this major celebration
where we had hundreds of people
come to this Corpus Christi procession
where we would process through the streets,
of the town.
And so it was very elaborate and very beautiful
and a token of our faith,
our strong faith
and the presence of the Blessed Sacrament.
But there was a lay person
who went to a fairly wealthy person
and asked them for donations
and they said, for what?
And they said, for flowers for Corpus Christi.
And the person said, that's a waste
because flowers only last a short time
and you spend all that money.
And it really made me think
of what Judas had said
about wasting the ointment,
the costly ointment.
But we don't waste things
when it comes to God
and we didn't stop spending that money
for flowers.
And we kept doing it year after year.
And another comment at that time
was that this is too extravagant.
It's too much time spent,
too much work.
And it made me think too,
when you love somebody,
you love God,
you don't think of limitations.
You try to do as much as you can
to make the Beloved happy
and that's what we are striving to do.
So when you want to imitate the saints,
imitate saints like St. Paul
who would exhaust himself
through his ministry.
He would travel from the ends of the earth.
He went around the world three times.
Traveling by foot
and going through all kinds of persecutions
and struggles and difficulties
because of his great love for God.
And that's generosity.
And generosity, we can show it
in so many different ways.
St. Alphonsus, St. Joseph Cafaso as well,
they both took a vow
not to waste any time.
And St. Alphonsus
wrote many, many books,
volumes of books
showing his love for God.
Showing his love for God
and generosity.
And I think we can conclude
with the memorable words
of St. Therese
and her great generosity
being a Carmelite nun
in the convent.
How much can you do there?
But she wanted to do
and wanted to do much
and she's the patron for missions
and she, with her immense love,
said,
to be your spouse, my Jesus,
to be a Carmelite,
to be through my union with you,
a mother of souls.
Surely this should be enough,
yet I feel the call
for more vocations still.
I want to be a warrior,
a priest, an apostle,
a doctor of the church,
a martyr.
There is no heroic deed
I do not wish to perform.
I feel as daring as a crusader,
ready to die for the church
upon the battlefield.
But to be a martyr
is what I long for
most of all.
I do not desire
any one kind of torture.
I would be satisfied
only with them all.
And she continued in this way,
saying,
Jesus, my love,
I have at last found my vocation.
It is love.
And it is love
that will make us generous.
So let us cultivate
great, great love,
great, strong, deep love
for God and for neighbor
and do much for him
and for our neighbors.
Amen.
Amen.
Amen.
Amen.
Amen.
Amen.
Amen.
Amen.
Amen.
Amen.
Amen.
Amen.
Amen.
Amen.
Amen.
Amen.
Amen.
Amen.
Thanks for watching!