“But God said to him, ‘Fool! This night your soul is required of you, and the things you have prepared, whose will they be?’” (Luke 12:20)
We can often be like the man in the parable in Sunday’s Gospel, who is speaking to himself rather than to God or to anyone else. Not only does he address himself, but he uses the word “I” six times and the word “my” five times in just a few phrases, so absorbed is he in himself. He is attached to his material goods, and this attachment blocks his relationships with God and with others. It is not wrong to prudently plan the use of our goods, but this man does so in isolation, without prayer and without thinking of others. He could have asked God for guidance, or donated or sold his excess to those in need.
