The Priest at Prayer for July 21, Avarice

The Third Part - Vices and Virtues

Avarice

First Meditation - Evils of Avarice in the Priest

I. St. Paul speaks of avarice as a kind of idolatry - ­"that love of money which makes a man an idolater." (Eph. v, 5.)

Just as the idolater surrenders to a creature, adoring it as his God, the avaricious person surrenders and sacri­fices himself to riches, with an all-absorbing desire to possess them.

Once covetousness dominates over me, I shall regard and assign the amassing and worship and service of the ephemeral goods of earth, in the form of coin, chattels, or paper money; as the whole of life's purpose. My spiritual faculties will live a life of dedication to the worship of my idol. This will be the pursuit of my probing mind day and night. This will be my love above all other loves. My heart, created for the God of heaven, will be full of the craving for wealth - auri sacra fames - and this will be my despicable god, whom I shall love with my whole heart, with my whole soul, with my whole mind, and with all my strength.

Even in the holiest works of my ministry: in preach­ing, administering the Sacraments, in the Sacrifice of the Mass, and in the very Person of Christ sacrificed, I shall seek no other value beyond their emolument value in cash. To this idol I shall sacrifice not only my own soul with its understanding, will, and affections, but the Word of God as well; yes, the very Person of the Word, if avarice becomes my ruling passion.

Have not these abominations the stench of sacrilege and apostasy about them? Should I not richly deserve, if I stooped so low, the bitter reproach conveyed through the prophet Isaias:

Thou hast made me to serve with thy sins (Is. xliii, 24),

or that uttered by Ezechiel:

"For a handful of meal, or a crust of bread, they will put me to shame before my own people." (Ez. xiii, 19)

II. There is a semblance of perfect happiness in the possession of riches: we can procure with them most of the good things of this life, and their sovereignty in this world is practically undisputed. Hence, the unruly desire to possess and retain, which is avarice, becomes by its force and widespread action the origin of other keen desires equally irregular and vicious; in other words, avarice is a capital sin.

From this poisoned source flows in an unquenchable and continual stream insensitive­ness and callousness of heart at the sight of our neigh­bours' sorrows and miseries - the hard-heartedness of the rich glutton towards Lazarus - and also a tormenting solicitude to increase our store.

Money alone does not satisfy the covetous man; in order to acquire and retain his ill-gotten goods he resorts to violence, extortion, deceit, perjury, fraud, treachery, and every species of injustice. And in the case of a covetous or avaricious priest, these injustices would find expression in his imposing taxes and stole-fees in accord­ance with his craving for quick gains, not with the rulings of Canon Law and common honesty; he will be led, in imitation of Judas, to maladminister the sacred property of the poor, of the Church, of Christ, and to fleece the devout or simple people under the pretext of piety.

You may think this an exaggeration, but, if the priest is avaricious, what other line of business or source of income can he exploit for quick gains outside the sphere of the altar and public worship and whatever pertains thereto?

III. To the above-mentioned evils of priestly avarice must be added another no less serious. Zeal for the salvation of souls is diametrically opposed to, and absolutely in­compatible with, greed for gain and hoarding; therefore, those works of zeal which do not yield ready cash, which bring no increase to his emoluments, will be a hindrance to him, a hateful task, an irreparable loss of time; because to him "time is money."

He will not exercise these "non-productive" duties of the ministry, or, if he cannot evade them entirely, he will spare as little time for them as possible, and will never put his whole heart and mind into them. They will be, for a priestly victim of avarice, nothing more than matters of form and tiresome courtesies.

And what are those unproduc­tive priestly duties? Catechetical instruction, the preach­ing that goes with his appointment, the confessional, attending the sick and poor; all these will be the target of his hatred and contempt, as being the enemies of his happiness.

Not all these dark stains defile my conscience; that, I can well and piously believe; but am I sure of not being contaminated by a few drops, so to speak, of this deadly poison in a diluted form? Even diluted they can gradually blacken my soul, obscure my ways of thought and action; they can imperceptibly cast me almost unawares at the feet of the golden calf.

QUERIES

Instead of resolutions, today I'm going to put myself some queries on a number of points, with full deter­mination to correct, if necessary, anything crooked or not quite straight and honest, anything unfair or frankly dishonest, that may emerge from this self-examination.

1. Money being the common denominator for all external goods, avarice usually takes the form of avid desire for money - aeris aviditas; so, do I experience that immoderate craving for money? has it become a sort of kink in my mind? has it become a minting-machine for converting all my activities of body and soul into money?

2. Is your desire to acquire and hold on to things a desire that goes unrestrained? The principle that should govern this desire is as follows:

All exterior goods and possessions interchangeable among themselves or exchangeable for money - such is the general meaning of "riches" - are in the nature of useful means to an end; therefore, these goods must necessarily be adjusted to a cer­tain order or measure in keeping with what is necessary or useful for the maintenance of man's life according to his particular state and condition, and in harmony with his eternal interests.

It follows, then, that the practical consideration in matters of desiring, seeking and possessing material goods is simply: "Are they necessary or convenient in order to live?"

3. The sin of avarice comes in when this practical consideration is set aside, when acquiring and retaining go beyond the limits approved by right reason, for the mere delight of possessing, of continually increasing one's store, or for the purpose of employing possessions in ways that are sinful. The essence of avarice is the immoderate craving to have things.

How often have I been unrestrained in my desires? How often have I trespassed, in my desire for gain? How often have I, as a priest, yielded to avarice? Have I struggled with myself in order to acquire the noble virtue of generosity, which moderates according to reason this affection and craving for possession?

4. Avarice is a twofold disorder:
(a) In acquiring and retaining, it goes beyond what is proper and just, either taking by force what belongs to another or keeping it against the owner's reasonable will; this is avarice in its crudest form of injustice, the avarice of thieves, extortioners, forgers, dishonest admin­istrators, etc. Surely, such ignoble company is not mine! But it is not altogether impossible!
(b) In the affections of the heart towards riches, avarice entails inordinate pleasure and disorder: a too ardent desire or fondness for them, excessive delight and complacency in them, even though there may be no question of wanting to appropriate another's belongings unjustly. This type of avarice, less blameworthy than the former type, is still something base and vile; it is in clean opposition to the virtue of generosity, and, if nurtured, can develop into the first type. Could I
swear that I am not a prey to this form of covetous­ness? If I were, I should sooner or later warrant the terrible words of St. John Chrysostom: "tenebrae animae est pecuniarum cupido" - the craving for money is darkness to the soul.

5. All avarice is a sin, but not all of the same gravity. The first type of avarice we have mentioned is grave sin (per se, ex genere suo) with the gravity attach­ing to theft and robbery; but it could be venial sin through lack of perfect knowledge and wilfulness (ex imperfectione actus); or when the quantities concerned are small - ex parvitate materiae. If I have committed sins of avarice of this type, have they been grievous sins? If they have, there is a name for me: thief.

As regards the second type of avarice: disorderly craving will amount to mortal sin only if I gloat on worldly possessions to the extent of preferring them to charity; that is, if for love of worldly goods I am ready to offend the love of God and the neighbour by break­ing some serious precept of the divine law. If I am dis­posed to forfeit riches rather than offend God in this way, my avarice does not exceed venial sin.

What is my position? Where do I stand as regards my affections for the perishable things of earth? How far do these affections go? Where do I draw the line?

6. In conclusion, have I stooped so far as to convert the corruptible treasures of earth into objects of a spiritual love? Avarice is a spiritual disorder, because what takes delight in the possessing and counting of riches and in gloating over them is not the body but the soul, the soul created to find its delight in God.

That is why St. John calls this vice concupiscentia oculorum (1 John ii, 16), covetousness of the eyes, that is, of the intelligence. And this is a serious aberration and debasement.
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Adapted from The Priest at Prayer
by Fr. Eugenio Escribano, C.M. (© 1954)
Translated by B.T. Buckley, C.M.

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Please pray for our priests and pray for vocations to the priesthood!