18th Sunday in Ordinary Time - Cycle C

Ecclesiastes 1:2; 2:21-23

“For what profit comes to man from all the toil and anxiety of heart with which he has labored under the sun?” (Ecclesiastes 2:22)

Why do we work? Work is a form of sacrifice–giving up the goods of the short term for rewards in the long term.

In “Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire,” Fred and George Weasley work to get leprechaun gold. The gold looks and feels real. It appears to be valuable; however, after a short time, it magically disappears. The brothers are outraged, having been cheated of real gold. Why the outrage? The Weasleys sacrificed for something that was so short-lived that it was worthless; it was vanity.

The gold of the Weasleys faded quickly, but what if our gold is doing the same? At some point, every single dollar that you own will be out of circulation. It won’t be long before all your possessions get passed on to the next person. Not only will your wealth be gone, but eventually every trace of you will be removed from the earth. The central point of the book of Ecclesiastes is that striving after worldly goods is all vanity. Everything on this earth will eventually be no more.

Jesus echoes this truth in the parable of the rich fool. The man devotes all of his time and energy to accumulating wealth and storing it up for himself. But God responds to him, “You fool, this night your life will be demanded of you; and the things you have prepared, to whom will they belong?” (Luke 12:20). Like leprechaun gold, all of his wealth is no longer his upon death, it is all left behind to “another who has not labored over it” (Ecclesiastes 2:21). No amount of earthly wealth can last forever.

There are, however, goods to be achieved that have eternal value which justify our work on earth. God offers us eternal salvation through his Son, Jesus. By following Jesus, we build virtues that prepare us for the next life. These virtues are fruits that advance God’s never-ending Kingdom. The question for us is whether our sacrifices (money, time, energy) are spent on what is eternal, or on the leprechaun gold.