So, is this bad?

This is something I’ve been thinking about lately: A couple of weeks ago, there was a reading at Mass about the widow who met Jeremiah who asked her to make him something to eat. You may remember the story: she only had a little oil and flour left, and planned to cook something for her and he son, and then that would be it for them. Nothing left to do but die.

So here comes this guy asking for something from someone so poor she was near death. And darned if she didn’t go and do it anyway.

Coupled with this reading was a gospel about the widow who put only a few pennies into the collection basket at the temple, while the fat cats were dropping in some big coin. Jesus pointed out that she gave more than the rich people, since she gave from her need rather than her surplus, as the well to do people were doing.

This has been bothering me for a while. What kind of faith did these people have that they were able to do these things without hesitation? Would I use my last resources to feed some stranger who had just wandered into town? Do I do anything that’s not from my surplus of money or time?

Give till it hurts? I don’t think so. We are pretty comfortable. It’s kind of nice. We are able to help our kids, our grandchild. We have a secret savings account for him. Fourteen years from now, when he is looking at college, we’ll have a little something for him. A church secretary says we give more than most to the parish, and I feel we don’t give enough. I’m up at church a lot lately, doing things that need to be done for some group or other I belong to, but it’s not a big deal. If I weren’t there, I’d just be sitting in my chair reading or at the computer blogging or working.

So where does this leave me? Feeling uncomfortable about being comfortable.