18th Sunday in Ordinary Time
Cycle B
August 2, 2015 4:00pm and 5:30pm
Saint Margaret
Parish, Bel Air
The Madoff Fraud
About
seven years ago, one of the biggest financial frauds in history took place.
Can you
remember the name Bernie Madoff? I can
still remember the man’s name and watching the news about what he did.
Bernie
Madoff was a New York stockbroker and he swindled investors out of more than
$50 billion. Investors found their
portfolios, their retirement savings and the college funds for their children
wiped out.
Madoff
is now serving a 150-year prison term. Besides
losing their money, many of Madoff’s investors have seen their homes lost and
even their marriages and families broken apart.
But some
of them have shown great strength and have even gained a new perspective on
life. One couple’s story is especially
telling – he at age 75 and she at age 66.
He
retired in 2004 and they were enjoying a very, very comfortable
retirement. But then they lost 80% of
their assets in the Madoff scheme.
They
had to sell homes in New Jersey, Florida, and Vermont. They now live in a small house in a Vermont
community.
This
couple says that they feel lucky. They
realize that what they lost has not affected their health and the love between
them and with their children.
He
says, “When your life gets altered
overnight, you realize that you don’t have to belong to a country club or drive
an expensive car. You certainly don’t
have to own three separate dwelling places.”
Recently,
they went to their old country club for a wedding reception. This made them realize that it is not just
their circumstances that have changed.
They
themselves have changed. She says, “That’s not who we are anymore.”
The Lesson
This
husband and wife may not realize it, but they help to illustrate what Jesus is
saying in today’s gospel.
They understand
that personal peace and fulfillment is not driven by perishable, material
things. Rather, it is the imperishable,
spiritual things that really enrich us.
Our
relationships with loved ones, our relationship with God, our giving of self
for the well-being of one another, our good use of the gifts God has given us –
these are the things that count. These
are the things that lead to satisfaction and the ultimate fullness of life.
Jesus
says it so simply: “Do not work for food
that perishes but for food that endures for eternal life.” I want to draw two simple conclusions from
this.
1. The Eucharist and the
Imperishable
The first is that
one reason why Jesus gives us the Eucharist may be to remind us of what that
couple now understands.
On the one hand, all
of us need to make a living. We have to
work and be concerned about finances.
And we may enjoy nice
clothes and the latest Smartphone and lots of other things. But, the Eucharist, the Mass brings us back every
week to our center, back to the truth of things.
It reminds us that
what counts is “food that endures for
eternal life” – imperishable food. This
is to be our driving concern in life.
2. The Eucharist and the Perishable
The second conclusion
is that the Eucharist sustains those, even those of us, who do not have enough
of the perishable.
The word perishable stands for food, rent, a
mortgage payment, medical care, things like that. I think the word perishable also includes love, a sense of belonging, and a feeling
of acceptance – things that are not material, but very real human needs.
At one point or
another, many of us will feel the lack of some of these perishables. The Eucharist sustains
us in those times.
It helps us to get
by. Jesus as “the bread of life” is one thing we can count on when other things
are lacking.
Conclusion
So, the example
and wisdom of a couple who had everything – at least everything perishable –
and then lost practically all of it leads us to some good reflection on today’s
gospel.
