Today we return to “Ordinary Time” in our liturgical calendar. Ordinary Time begins in January after the Christmas season, is interrupted by Lent and Easter and continues after Easter until the start of the season of Advent.

It is a period when a Book in the Bible is read continuously. We are in Year A and the Sunday Gospels will be taken from Matthew. Mark is read in Year B and Luke in Year C, while John’s Gospel is read during the seasons of Advent, Christmas, Lent and Easter.

In Ordinary Time we journey with Jesus during His public ministry, which, in Matthew’s Gospel, has just begun. Jesus calls His first four disciples and, together with crowds who have begun to follow Him, He climbs a mountain, a place of divine revelation.

He begins to preach a sermon on the meaning of discipleship. The Sermon on the Mount is a portrait of Jesus Himself. This week’s Gospel is part of that sermon. He is saying to us that we have to make a choice between God and money and He is assuring us that there is no need to worry as He is taking care of us.

If a survey is done in the world today we may not be too surprised to find that the love of money is replacing the love of God, to the extent that the more money we have, the less we feel a need for God.

We believe that enough money can buy us anything we need. This brings to mind a statement made by an old pharmacist who said, “You know, you can’t buy life in a bottle”. I wonder if he was aware of the sermon he preached in that short statement.

I once belonged to a ministry that took care of the aged and the sick of the parish, many of whom were financially poor. What struck me forcibly was the peace and love that we encountered when we visited them.

I recognised that these persons possessed riches that money could not buy. When we arrived at these homes, even if the person was in pain, we were always greeted with a welcoming smile and we felt that they were genuinely pleased to see us.

Many times as we left a home, the aged parishioner would insist that we took something from the little they had - maybe some fruit or vegetables from a kitchen garden.

There were no burglar bars or security systems. I always left these homes feeling uplifted and I realised that I received much more than I gave.

The title of a story “The freedom of Poverty” comes to mind. These parishioners were not told by the latest “infomercials” what they must have in order to be happy, comfortable or e-trendy. They depended on God each day for their survival and they did not doubt that He would supply their needs.

Their homes, in the midst of ageing and illness, were places of peace and joy.

Today, the pursuit of wants has replaced the pursuit of needs and this takes up so much of our energy, time and money that we lose our identity. Our possessions usually end up possessing us.

We are told by the advertising agencies who we should be and what we should do, and so, our goals are not really set by us. Some years ago I spoke to one of the top business executives in our society. He was experiencing emotional trauma as he had suddenly realised - to quote him, “that he could remember every deal he had closed for the company but he could not remember ever having attended an important occasion in his children’s lives”.

He wished that he could have traded his “successful” business ventures for another chance to get know his children as he had missed their growing up.

Heavenly Father, thank you for taking care of us so that we need not worry.

Thank you for the many times we have been blessed, sometimes without our even being aware of your blessing. Thank you for your love and your care.

Thank you for the humble people we meet whose lives are living examples of your love.

Forgive us for the times we worry and try to take control of our lives without coming to you. Forgive us for not being Kingdom people, turning away from your righteousness until we realise how much is lacking in our lives.

Help us Lord to trust you, to see the futility of trying to live any other way. Help us to see the real riches in our lives, to understand that in you lies our peace and security. AMEN

Yvonne Farmer is a lecturer at the Catholic Bible School and is a member of Lectio Divina groups at the Santa Rosa Church and the Holy Cross Chapel, Arima.