Investing our Bag of Gold

Introduction

The bottom line

Before I set to work at a homily, I first have to figure out what the scripture text itself is really trying to say. When in doubt I always pull out my humongous volume containing side by side, eight different English translations of one and the same Greek passage. I read them all and then come up with what I think is the meaning of the text. In today’s parable a man leaves on a journey and entrusts five talents to one of his servants, two to another and one to a third. Talent in this scripture text doesn’t mean what we normally mean when we say, “He has a real talent for writing.” In the parable, talent is Jewish money.

My humongous volume offers a variety of translations for that Jewish money. The Living Bible translation, for example, says that a man was leaving on a journey, and he entrusted $5000 dollars to one of his servants, $2000 to another and $1000 to a third. The Phillips Modern English translation says he entrusted 5000 pounds to one of his servants, 2000 pounds to another 1000 pounds to a third. That would be meaningful to the Brits. The New English Bible translation simply speaks of “bags of gold.” To one servant the master gave five bags of gold, to another two bags of gold and to a third one bag of gold. Probably some brand new translation not yet written will read, “He entrusted 5000 euros to one of his servants, 2000 euros to another and 1000 euros to a third.” That would be meaningful to Europeans today, except for the Brits who can’t let go of their pounds.

The other translations in my humongous volume do not worry about being meaningful. They simply read “talents” as our text does today, but that then exposes us to a wrong or at least a confused understanding of the parable. Talent in the parable doesn’t refer to some natural gift but to Jewish money, and the parable makes the point that we should be good stewards of the dollars, the pounds, the bags of gold, the euros entrusted to us. We should be good entrepreneurs and brave investors of them.

As a homilist, I always try to find the bottom line of the Sunday gospel placed before us. For me that’s the line in which the whole passage peaks. When I am about to read the bottom line to the Sunday assembly I always pause before it and then speak it clearly and slowly. The bottom line for me today is: Out of fear I didn’t invest the one thousand dollars you gave me. Out of fear I buried them. Out of fear I buried the one bag of gold gave me.

The fear that stoked the fires of Kristallnacht (Nov. 9, 1938)

Look at what fear makes us humans do. On Nov. 9, 1938 (67 years ago last Wednesday), the Nazis, out of some inexplicable fear of Jews, went rampaging throughout all of Germany, and in one night destroyed 7000 Jewish businesses, and burned down 191 synagogues. Nov. 9, 1938 goes down in history as the”Krystallnacht,” ”The Night of the Shattered Glass,” and it marks the beginning of the Jewish Holocaust which in time would consume six million human lives in the crematories of Dachau, Buchenwald, and Auschwitz.

The fear that built the Berlin Wall (Nov. 9^th 1989)

Look at what fear makes us humans do. On Aug. 13, 1961 the Communists began the construction of the Berlin Wall. It was 10 feet wide and 15 feet tall. It ran for 28 miles through the city of Berlin. It was built out of fear that people inside would escape to freedom. It was also built out of fear that people outside would look in and see how miserably East Germans were living. Erich Honecker, an old party chief, vowed that the wall would stand for a hundred years. It lasted for only 28 years. In one historic moment, at the stroke of midnight, Nov. 9, 1989 (16 years ago last Wednesday), mobs scaled the wall, and with hammer and chisel destroyed it. Time magazine for Nov. 20, 1989 said, “It was one of those rare moments when the tectonic plates of history shift beneath people's feet, and nothing is quite the same anymore. For West and East Germans it was Christmas, New Year's and Easter all rolled into one." The only ones missing that historic moment were the 191 people who were shot to death trying to scale the wall that fear built.

The fear that struck down the Twin Towers

Look at what fear makes us humans do. Islam for many centuries, especially during the Dark Ages from the 5^th to 11^th century, was the center of the universe. It eclipsed Europe in the fields of medicine, chemistry, mathematics, art, poetry, spirituality and physics. But for two centuries now, Islam has been on the losing side of history because of all the modernization and secularization that is closing in on it from us infidels. Out of fear of the infidel world, Islamic fundamentalists on 9/11 slammed two 747s, as weapons of mass destruction, into the World Trade Center. With one grand slam they laid low not only two Twin Towers but also three thousand innocent human beings. At that moment the tectonic plates of history shifted again beneath our feet, and nothing has been the same anymore. Out of fear of the infidel world, Islamic fundamentalists terrorize us with daily reports of carnage caused by suicide bombers. Last week it was in Jordan and next week it’ll be somewhere else.

The fear that kills gays

Look at what fear makes us humans do. Out of some strange fear of gays (sometimes called homophobic fear) two skinheads beat Matt Shepard to a pulp, chained him to a wooden fence out in the country and left him there to die in his tears and blood. Out of the same homophobic fear the Rev. Mr. Phelps, inspired by religious hate and quoting Romans 9:13, sported a banner at the lad’s funeral declaring that “God hates fags and buries them in hell.”

The fear that froze the church

Look at what fear makes us humans do. Out of fear of the Protestant Revolution of the 16^th century, the church summoned the Council of Trent (1545-1563). Out of fear, the Council wrote us a theology which put the teachings of faith safely into deep freeze and locked them all up in prisons of certainty. (That’s no criticism; it’s simply a statement of that old process of action and reaction.) That deep freeze and fear-founded certainty of Trent lasted for four hundred years. Most of us were raised on it. Then on Nov. 4, 1958 the college of Cardinal elected Giuseppe Roncalli as Pope John XXIII (b. Nov. 25, 1881). That great pope looked with pity upon his church which had buried its bag of gold in deep freeze. Driven by goodness and not by fear, he summoned his church to Vatican II which opened on Oct. 11, 1962. By that time the church had become weary of four hundred years of fear, and fear was already dying of old age, as it always does when it hangs around too long.

Signs of hope

The yearly “Call to Action” convention was held again in Milwaukee last month. It’s a call to the church and Catholics to take up all the unsafe issues like the celibacy of priests, the ordination of women, birth control, divorce and remarriage, homosexuality, intercommunion, etc. I never attend the convention. I do sneak in once and a while for a free session. Last year I attended a Saturday morning Mass celebrated by a woman priest. I survived it. This year I didn’t do any sneaking. I simply asked a friend how it went. She said she was pleased to hear theologian Fr. Richard P. McBrien say that he is very hopeful about Pope Benedict XVI. He is very hopeful about the Pope who in his earlier days as watchdog for Pope John Paul II would silence theologians. He silenced Hans Küng who spoke of such an unsafe issue as papal infallibility. McBrien is very hopeful about the Pope who on the day of his inauguration said, “My program of governance is not to do my own will but to listen [not to silence people but to listen to them].” McBrien is very hopeful about the Pope who on Saturday, Sept. 24, 2005 put his money where his mouth was. On that day he chose to meet with and listen to the man whom he had silenced--- Hans Küng.

It was a reunion of old friends who had taught together at the famous Catholic University of Tübingen in Germany during the 1960s. In fact, it was Fr. Hans Küng who urged the university to hire the then Fr. Joseph Ratzinger. The two served together as theological experts for the German bishops at Vatican II. At Tübingen they had a standing weekly dinner appointment on Thursday evenings to discuss a journal they edited together.

But with time the two parted company, and Küng eventually became Ratizinger’s arch-enemy and nemesis. Because Küng challenged Roman Catholic teaching about papal infallibility, John Paul II revoked his right to teach Catholic theology. It was known that Ratizinger, as a member of the German Bishops’ Conference, played an important role in that revocation. From that time on, Küng was a staunch critic of Ratgzinger’s doctrinal positions and his methods of policing the church.

The animosity between the two grew to a high pitch. When another German Catholic theologian by the name of Johann Baptist Metz (also at odds with Ratizinger) celebrated his 70^th birthday in 1997 with a symposium, Archbishop Ratzinger was on the program. Surprisingly the two men spoke civilly and even a bit fondly of each other. That infuriated Küng and he bitterly remarked, “It is astonishing and a deep scandal that Metz would offer that Grand Inquisitor a forum. He is the chief authority of the Inquisitorial office. It ‘s like having a general conversation about human rights with the head of the KGB!”

Shortly after Benedict’s election on April 19^th 2005, Küng, the German theologian, requested a meeting with Benedict, the German pope who had silenced him years before. Küng had repeatedly requested a meeting with John Paul II, but the Pope never responded. Küng says that Benedict responded almost immediately. A date was set when the Pope would be in a more relaxed setting at his summer residence at Castel Gandolfo, a few miles south of Rome.

During a four-hour session that stretched over dinner, the two men listened to each other and essentially agreed to disagree on doctrinal matters. Back home in Germany, Küng said, “The things we have in common are more fundamental. We both are Christians, both priests in the service of the church, and we have personal respect for one another.” He also said his meeting with Benedict was “very joyful.” There were “no reproaches, no polemics.” It was a “sign of mutual respect” and “a step forward.”

That encounter between the two bodes well and gives hope to theologian McBrien and to us. Benedict is so free of fear that he is willing to listen to an arch-enemy who tells him, the pope, that he isn’t as infallible as he thinks he is. There’s hope, then, that Benedict will also be willing to listen to us, the church, as we speak to him about all the unsafe issues in our human and Catholic lives.

Conclusion

Go and do likewise

How foolish was the servant in the parable today! He should have buried his fear. Instead he buried his bag of gold which he should have wisely invested. How wise was Pope Benedict! He buried the fear that had him silencing theologians for years. Instead he wisely decided to invest the bag of gold that the Lord had given him on the day of his inauguration. Ite Missa est. Go, the Mass is ended. Go and do likewise. Bury your fear and invest the bag of gold the Lord has given you.