Mt 6: 19-23
Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust consume and where thieves break in and steal; but store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust consumes and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
The eye is the lamp of the body. So, if your eye is healthy, your whole body will be full of light; but if your eye is unhealthy, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light in you is darkness, how great is the darkness!
New Revised Standard Version, copyright 1989, by the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved. USCCB approved. http://www.usccb.org/bible/approved-translations
My Choices for Good
In the movie, “Indiana Jones: The Last Crusade,” there is a scene where the arch-villain has the opportunity to grasp eternal life if he can only choose the real chalice which Jesus used. Of course, he wrongly selects the most rich and jewel-encrusted chalice; and as we watch his horrible death, the ancient knight of the Holy Grail says, “He chose poorly.”
As newer Jesuits, we were exhorted towards “custody of the eyes,” that is to retain modesty where we look. It was common to tease each other about “custody of the eyes” when one of us might comment on the state of another’s room. Jesus also exhorts disciples, “If your right eye causes you to stumble, gouge it out and throw it away.” (MT 5:29)
Our commitment to fulfilling our Christian lives includes that of choosing well. But we cannot just see it as a choice to not sin as such. But it is because, if we choose to fill our lives, in this case our eyesight, with evil and things of darkness, this will deny us the ability to fill ourselves with things of grace and light. In the case of eyesight, as it is said that “a picture is worth a thousand words,” this incredible gift is an opportunity to receive the sensory richness of the Kingdom of God, or otherwise.
The first paragraph of this passage expresses this same idea differently, “For where your treasure is, there also will be your heart.” How we choose to see is an expression of what we treasure of the world, and thus where we place our imagination, our hope and ultimately our faith.
What kind of choices am I making in what I read, what I look at on the internet, what TV shows I watch?
—Fr. Glen Chun, S.J. serves in campus ministry at Loyola University Chicago and is also minister of the Loyola Jesuit Community.
Prayer
Living God—stand by me. Hold me up. Be my strength when I am tired, my inspiration when I am bored, my life when I am listless.
Living God, I cannot always meet the standard expected of me, cannot always be the personality I am known for. Abba when I fail, Abba when I stumble—stand by me!
—Edwina Gately