This gospel is sometimes called the parable of the unjust steward, or if you want an updated title, sometimes it’s the story of the dishonest manager. But whatever you call it, it certainly doesn’t sound like a story where at the end, the moral is going to be, let’s find a way to be a little bit like that dishonest manager. But that is what we get. So if you have questions after having heard about this man and about what this story might mean, you’re not the only one in the past two thousand years who has felt that way. Let’s get to the heart of the story by…
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Today in the gospel we have another parable about what the “kingdom of heaven” is like. And when we hear the word “heaven” we immediately think two things: first, something way off in the future, definitely not now, and second, a world operating in a very different environment, maybe in the clouds, where everyone is on their best behavior and a whole different set of rules apply. So when Jesus starts a story that says “the kingdom of heaven is like,” we think he means this is the way things will be like in heaven when things are perfect. It will be great — off there in the future, when…
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If you have an iPhone, maybe you have used the virtual assistant it comes with, Siri. If not, I’m sure you have seen friends of yours who are now accustomed to speaking to their phones like they are human beings, giving Siri all sorts of assignments. My sister-in-law had gotten very accustomed to this, until one day when she asked Siri a fairly routine question, and she swears, Siri answered, “I’m sorry, I can’t do that for you right now.” I never really thought Siri was anything like a human assistant until I heard about that moment. It seems that even virtual assistants can drop the ball, and lose track…
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It doesn’t happen as often as it used to in business but it still happens. There’s a rather senior person where I work who as far as any of us can tell does absolutely nothing. I mean, nothing. He has been seen in his office at 3:30 in the afternoon calmly running one of those little electric shoe-buffing machines over his shoes, or, in a famous incident, sorting a little bag of Skittles candies into piles based on their colors. This is not out of Dilbert. I’m not making this stuff up. I know it never happens in the church, Father Tim, but in business you do find these scandalous…