In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and
of the Holy Spirit. Amen. Brothers and sisters,
at first this parable might not make much sense
to us in the modern world. Isn't it perfectly
normal for an older man to save up for his retirement?
Isn't that what this gospel is about? He had
lots. He could retire. He could eat, drink, and
be merry. He didn't have to worry about his material
support any longer. He had enough to sustain
himself indefinitely, so it seemed. What's wrong
with that? Why is this man called a fool? Well,
it seems that precisely the final verse of the
parable gives us a clue. He was rich, but not
rich toward God. Now, what does that mean, to
be rich? toward God. He was rich in terms of
this world, but he was not rich in terms of the
kingdom of heaven. Being from Alaska, you can
expect an Alaskan story from me, and that's what
I'm going to divulge now. It's a wonderful story,
one of my favorite Yupik Eskimo folktales of
a boy and his grandmother who are starving. They're
living all alone. Why there's no village nearby
is never explained. What happened to the boy's
parents? Forget that, they never tell you. And
why didn't they notice that they were out of
food yesterday? It's just the way the story begins.
The grandmother says to the grandson, grandson,
we're out of food. You'll have to go hunting.
The boy says, rather arrogantly, I'll be right
back. Now, why do I say this is arrogance? Because
the traditional belief among tribal peoples everywhere
is that the animals are wise, smart, strong,
and intelligent. You never catch an animal because
you tricked it or overpowered it. You only catch
the animal that allows you to catch it. Now,
that may seem preposterous to any of you who
have never gone hunting. But it's the universal
belief among tribal peoples everywhere. In fact,
if I can digress a bit, just to tell another
story in the midst of this one. The story that
both the Tlingit Indian people tell in southeast
Alaska and the Yupik Eskimo people say on the
opposite side of the state along the Bering Sea
is this. The first people arrived, at least in
Alaska, in what is now remembered as a huge clamshell.
And as the emerged raven, the leader of all the
animals, walked up to them and inspected this
group of humans. Shaking his head. Pathetic.
Ridiculous. You've got no wings. You can't fly.
You have no feathers. Your legs are short and
stubby. You obviously can't run very fast. And
worst of all, you have almost no fur. The first
day of winter and you're goners. I'm sorry to
inform you, but you have no future here. But
Raven felt sorry for the first human beings.
He called a convocation of all the Arctic animals.
Look what I found on the beach this morning,
Raven said. And all the animals examined the
first humans and came quickly to the same conclusion.
They can't run, they can't fly, they have no
claws worth anything, and their teeth are stubby
little bits that we don't even know what they're
going to eat. And worst of all, they're going
to freeze to death with the first blizzard. Exactly,
said Raven, I've come to the same conclusion.
The animals said, but Raven, they're kind of
cute. Let's keep them. Raven said, I have no
objection to that, but I don't see how it's going
to be possible. I'm open to your suggestions.
The animals conferred most of that day and returned
by evening with this proposition. They said,
what if we give these pathetic new creatures
our feathers and our fur for cover, for clothing?
And what if we give them our bodies, our flesh,
as meat? Couldn't they survive then? Raven seriously
considered this proposal and concluded, you know,
that just might work. But why would you do that?
What's in it for you? And the animals said, we
will give these ridiculous, pathetic new creatures
our feathers and fur for cover, for clothing,
and we will give them our bodies as meat in exchange
for gratitude and respect. And that's the deal.
That's the covenant the animals made with the
human beings. You can see immediately why Christianity
made such good sense to such people. When the
gospel came and said, the Lord came to offer
himself to you, to sacrifice himself for your
salvation, and as we sing on Holy Saturday, to
give himself precisely as food to the faithful.
Now back to my original story. The boy's going
hunting, you recall. And he walks all day, but
he said, I'll be right back. As if it's up to
him whether or not he will catch anything. And
the animals, having overheard this, withhold
themselves. They hide. He doesn't see a mosquito
that day, not a bird, not a squirrel. He walks
all day into the night. He's starving, he's hungry,
he's frustrated and exhausted. And finally, he
just collapses onto a tree stump. Just as he's
about to doze off to take something of a nap,
a tiny shrew, a mouse, runs right over his foot,
right over his boot. The boy jumps up. What was
that? He grabs a stick and clunks that little
mouse. Now holding it in the palm of his hand,
he's got the catch of the day. It's not much.
He told Granny he'd be right back. If he walks
all night, he can return this to her house. But
she'll laugh at him. You've been gone all day
and all night, and all you caught was this tiny
shrew, this little mouse. And what will Grandma
do with this? I tease my Yupik wife, there's
only one recipe in the Yupik cookbook. It starts
with boil water. She will make mouse soup. But
he'll get a tiny little bite, and so will she.
They'll both be starving. What's the point of
carrying this little mouse home only to be ridiculed
and then have to walk all the way back out here
to hunt again tomorrow? I'll eat it myself, he
rationalizes. I need to keep up my strength.
Granny's just sitting in the house sewing or
something back there. I'm expending all my energy.
I deserve this little snack. And so he devours
that little mouse and falls asleep. The next
morning, he resumes his hunt. He walks half the
day and comes to a pond about as big as this
church. In that pond, there are muskrats. Most
of the muskrats flee from the boy. But one of
them feels sorry for this pathetic, starving
kid and swims close enough for the boy now to
use an arrow to shoot that muskrat. Now he's
got lunch on a stick. It's good to feed one person,
but not enough to share with two. If he walks
all day and all night, he can return this to
Grandma's house, but he'll have to share it with
her. She'll get three or four bites, and he'll
get the other half, and they'll both still be
starving. It's not worth it to walk all the way
back to Grandma's. I'll eat it myself. I'll get
something better, more substantial for Granny
tomorrow. And so he eats the muskrat. The next
day, he comes to a lake filled with beaver. Most
of the beaver flee from the boy, but one approaches
close enough for him to spear that beaver. Now
the beaver is a substantial amount of meat, but
the boy is so hungry now, without even thinking
of his grandmother, he devours the entire beaver.
The next day he arrives at the sea coast and
kills a seal and eats the whole seal. The next
day he kills a walrus and he eats the whole walrus.
The next day he kills a sea lion and he eats
the whole sea lion. And finally, he finds a beached
whale the size of this church, and he eats the
whole whale. Now this stretches him to a size
taller than this roof. He's become something
of a big, fat, ugly monster at this point, but
he's thirsty. So he kneels down and swallows
the Bering Sea. And this makes him larger than
any dinosaur that roamed the planet. the biggest,
ugliest monster that has ever existed, and he
walks home in seven giant steps, shaking the
earth beneath his feet, creating an earthquake
with every step. He finally arrives at his grandmother's
house. Then he realizes what has happened to
him. The house is only the size of me compared
to my shoe. He looks down at that house and realizes
what a big, fat, ugly monster he has become.
And Granny is still in there a week later, faint
with hunger, sewing. She calls out faintly, Who's
there? The boy answers, Don't worry, Grandma,
it's just me. She calls out to him, Well, then
come in, dear. He answers, I can't. And he starts
to cry. Grandma calls to him, what's the matter,
grandson? He answers, not untruthfully, I've
brought home too much food. Grandma says, that's
all right, grandson. You can come in through
the roof. Come in through the smoke hole. He
places one huge foot on one side of the house
and another huge foot on the opposite side. And
then she calls up to him, now jump in, head first.
Head first. As if he were a gymnast in the Olympics
or on a diving board or trampoline. He bends
his knees and he throws his whole body up into
the air. And as his head descends toward the
chimney of the house, Grandma within holds up
her magical ivory sewing needle. He passes through
the eye, through the hole of that needle, and
she transforms him back into his normal size.
And out of him comes the ocean, the whale, the
walrus, the sea lion, the seal, the beaver, and
all that food. And the story traditionally ends
with grandmother saying to the boy, Oh, grandson,
what a good provider you are. Now you can just
say that's a silly old Eskimo fairy tale. But
I submit to you it's a very serious story that
ties us directly to today's gospel. The boy did
not grow up to be a human being. The boy did
not grow up to be the kind of creature he was
intended by God to be. He grew up to be a monster.
Why? Because he cared only for himself. He didn't
care about his grandmother. He didn't care about
anyone as long as he got what he wanted, which
is exactly, of course, the way all babies are.
An infant, when they're hungry, will cry till
they're fed. An infant, when they're uncomfortable,
will cry until their needs are met. An infant
will demand what it needs or wants and will scream
until he gets it. That's how we all are as infants.
But what does it mean to grow up? To be a human
being. To be a real man or a real woman. It means,
in the spirit of today's parable, to care about
others. The boy in the story cared only for himself
and grew up to be a monster. My students at the
elementary school ask, is this story true? And
I have to respond, in some ways it is. Because
whether you grow up to be a Christ -like person
or a monster is your option. And how do we become
inhuman, insensitive monsters instead of real
people, Christ -like human beings? By caring
only for ourselves. By being rich in this world,
but not rich toward God. How do we become rich
toward God? By giving away as much as we can.
This is the rule. What in this life you save
for yourself is garbage. It actually counts against
you. And what you give away in the name of Christ
is gold. It's your fortune. Your heavenly riches
will be calculated precisely based on how much
you gave away. How much you provided for others,
not what you kept for yourself. The ballgame
rules are the opposite of this world. We admire
and respect and defer to those who are wealthy
and powerful and influential, who have made a
lot of money. We think they're something special.
But every nickel and dime of their fortune will
count against them on Judgment Day, as it does
for today's man in today's... parable. He was
rich in this world, but is there any evidence
that he ever cared about anybody else but himself?
Like the boy in my Eye of the Needle story, he
grew up to be a monster. He was capable of helping
many and helped none. He was capable of being
generous and he was stingy. He cared only for
himself and ended his life not rich toward God.
So as we approach Thanksgiving Day in this coming
month, let's give thanks, not just by feasting,
eating, drinking, and being merry. It's allowed.
We give thanks to God for his blessings. It was
the land of this rich man that produced his harvest,
and the land was God's gift to him. Our land
is God's gift to us. But in order to... Properly
give thanks as Orthodox Christians. Let us not
become the monster in today's Eskimo story and
care only for ourselves, but give thanks to God
by being generous to others. Because we will
be rich toward God only to the extent that we
have given away at least some of the blessings
with which God has showered us. Amen.