Wealth and Prosperity

Happy chinese new year!! Gong xi fa cai!

As we celebrate and wish for a more prosperous Tiger year. I think it is good for us to ponder about the prosperity. In this long weekend, I read few books and article about wealth. These articles gave me new insights that help me in my reflection about wealth.

Let me begin with the definition of wealth according to Oxford dictionary. There are three meanings of wealth 1 an abundance of valuable possessions or money. 2 the state of being rich. 3 an abundance or profusion of something desirable. I dare to say that wealth is universally desirable by people. Most of us desire to be wealthy. I am currently working and I receive salary that I use to meet my need and also to purchase some properties ( not limited to the properties in most Singapore’s resident).

So I asked my self whether my statement is true or not, if yes, how can desire for wealth is universal? Is it just a social culture or trend? Where does this desire come from? We desire to eat because we feel hungry, we feel hungry because our stomach is empty, or our glucose level in our blood is below requirement. We eat to replenish our energy so that we can sustain our life. We desire to eat so that we can preserve ourselves. This desire to eat is innate in us, and something that is innate in man comes from the Creator. He created us in this manner so we will never forget to eat and perish.

“Self preservation is one of the first laws of nature, and it implies a legitimate self-love, for if we did not love ourselves we could not continue to live.” Peace of Soul, Fulton Sheen.

I read Fulton Sheen book entitled Peace of Soul, and I discovered some explanation regarding this desire of wealth or possession. On page 156 ” Just as we are free on the inside because we can call our soul our own, so we want to be free on the outside by calling possession our own. Personal or private ownership is natural to man, it is the economic guarantee of freedom as the soul is its spiritual guarantee.”  This desire of private possession and accumulation of wealth also come from God, as desire is a good desire. In the beginning the Creator commanded Adam and Eve to subdue the earth ( Gen 1 :28) which I also discussed in my previous post.

I also read Encyclical by Pope Leo XIII entitled Rerum Novarum which also stated “For, every man has by nature the right to posses property as his own ( paragraph 6). In paragraph 5, he wrote that the reason or motive of working is to obtain property and to hold it as his very own. As we are working we receive in return renumeration as the exchange of our strength or skill or knowledge in the work that we accomplished. This reward (a.k.a money) is used for the satisfaction of our needs, and the excess of it we save it or invest his savings in properties which is owned by us.  Lastly in paragraph 9, ” private ownership is in accordance with the law of nature.”

If this desire is good and it is from God, why there are many verses in the bible are written against wealth and prosperity? Why we have heard many teachings that we should be wealthy? Why wealthy people are connotated as bad people? Fulton sheen further elaborate in the same book that all the good desire that is from God can be perverted. The perverted version of desire for wealth is avarice. It happens when the possesion or wealth no longer become the object but the subject.It is no longer man that posses the wealth, but man is possesed by it. God no longer become God, but Mammon become god.

As it is in the beginning, God gave the earth to Adam and Eve, that they could subdue and eat all the tree, just except of one tree. I think it is also with wealth, that God gives us the good desire to accumulate wealth but not to let the wealth posses us. I realize that the question is not whether rich people are good or bad, whether wealth is good or bad, but whether we obey His commandment or not. To love one another as we love ourselves.

I am writing this not to justified my own intention or to undermined poverty because there are some holy souls who are called by God who take the vow of poverty for the sake of the perversion in the Body. In conclusion, as we are hungry for food, or hungry for possesion, we should be hungry for the Giver first.

But seek first His Kingdom and His righteousness and all these things shall be yours as well (Matt 6 :33)

Fiat mihi secundum verbum tuum

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