8 March 2027 · Syro-Malabar Rite
Open in the Daily Word appAlso: Syro-Malankara Rite · Latin Rite · മലയാളം
“There is still one thing lacking. Sell all that you own and distribute the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me.” Luke 18:22
The fifth week of the Great Fast opens with a warning that sounds, at first, almost against fasting. Some teachers in Colossae had turned religion into a matter of diet and calendar, of visions and the worship of angels, and they judged the believers who did not keep their rules. Paul writes: “Therefore do not let anyone condemn you in matters of food and drink or of observing festivals, new moons, or sabbaths. These are only a shadow of what is to come, but the substance belongs to Christ.” Paul does not despise fasting; the Church fasted from the beginning, and the St Thomas Christians have kept the fifty days of the Great Fast with great seriousness for centuries, giving up meat and fish, often eating one meal a day, sometimes sleeping on a mat on the floor. But every practice is a shadow, and a shadow is cast by something solid. The solid thing is Christ. A fast that makes me proud, or that makes me watch what my neighbour eats, has kept the shadow and lost the substance. Paul names the root of the trouble: such people are “not holding fast to the head, from whom the whole body, nourished and held together by its ligaments and sinews, grows with a growth that is from God.” The Great Fast is meant to bind us more closely to the Head and to one another, never to divide the body into the strict and the lax.
In the Gospel a ruler comes to Jesus with the deepest question a person can ask: “Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” Jesus points him to the commandments, and the man answers honestly: “I have kept all these since my youth.” He is no hypocrite. He has kept the law, the shadow, faithfully. Then Jesus looks at him and says: “There is still one thing lacking. Sell all that you own and distribute the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me.” The one thing lacking is not one more rule. It is a Person: come, follow me. “But when he heard this, he became sad; for he was very rich.” Jesus does not run after him to lower the price. He says, with sorrow: “How hard it is for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God!” Not everyone is called to sell everything, as the apostles and the religious do; but everyone is asked what holds the heart. The Latin Church today remembers St John of God, a Portuguese soldier and bookseller who, after hearing a sermon in Granada, gave away his stock of books and spent the rest of his life carrying the sick poor into a house he opened for them. In many of our parishes the money saved by fasting is put into a Lenten box for the poor. It is a small way of hearing the same word: sell, give, come, follow.
Theme: “There is still one thing lacking. Sell all that you own and distribute the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me.”
The shadow and the substance, the good man who stopped one step short, and the call to follow Jesus with an undivided heart.
“Is not this the fast that I choose: to loose the bonds of injustice, to undo the thongs of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free, and to break every yoke?” Isaiah 58:6
“These are only a shadow of what is to come, but the substance belongs to Christ.” Colossians 2:17
Apply: Let your fast today end in one act of justice or kindness to someone who is burdened.
“Put no confidence in extortion, and set no vain hopes on robbery; if riches increase, do not set your heart on them.” Psalm 62:10
“There is still one thing lacking. Sell all that you own and distribute the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me.” Luke 18:22
Apply: Ask the Lord in silence today: what is the one thing still lacking in me? Write down the answer.
“Whoever is kind to the poor lends to the LORD, and will be repaid in full.” Proverbs 19:17
“For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” Matthew 6:21
Apply: Give this week, to the Lenten box or to a person in need, what your fasting has saved.
Every fast is a shadow; Christ is the substance, and he asks for the heart, not only the plate.
The ruler kept the commandments and went away sad; let us give, and come, and follow.
Take-home resolution: Give away this week what the fast has saved, and do not judge anyone else's fast.
Dear friends, Paul warns the Colossians: do not let anyone condemn you in matters of food and drink or of festivals; these are only a shadow of what is to come, but the substance belongs to Christ (Colossians 2:16–17).
We fast seriously in this Great Fast, as our forefathers did. But the fast is a shadow cast by Christ. If it makes us proud, or makes us judge our neighbour's plate, we have kept the shadow and lost the substance. Let our fast bind us to Christ, our Head, and to one another.
A rich ruler had kept all the commandments since his youth. Jesus told him: there is still one thing lacking; sell all that you own, give to the poor, and come, follow me (Luke 18:22). The man went away sad, for he was very rich.
The one thing lacking is not another rule; it is Jesus himself. St John of God gave away his books and spent his life carrying the sick poor. What holds my heart? This week let us give what our fast has saved, and follow him more closely. Amen.
Children, a rich man asked Jesus how to go to heaven. Jesus said: share what you have with the poor and come with me. But he loved his things too much and went away sad. Can you share one of your things with someone this week, and stay close to Jesus?
Lord Jesus Christ, you are the substance of every shadow and the treasure of every heart. Do not let our fasting make us proud or quick to judge, but bind us more closely to you, our Head, and to one another. Show us the one thing still lacking in us, and give us the courage not to go away sad, but to give, and to come, and to follow you. Through the prayers of St John of God, make us servants of the sick and the poor. Amen.
Both readings ask what we are really holding on to. Colossians warns against people who make food, festivals and visions the measure of a believer, and it answers that all these are a shadow, while the substance belongs to Christ. In Luke a good man has kept the commandments from his youth and still lacks one thing, because his wealth holds him. For the Great Fast the lesson is close to home: the fast is not the goal. It clears the hands so that they can hold on to Christ.
Setting.
Colossae was a small town in the Lycus valley of Asia Minor, near Laodicea and Hierapolis (4:13). The community heard the Gospel from Epaphras (1:7), and the letter suggests that Paul had not met them in person (2:1). Teachers there were pressing rules about food and holy days, with talk of visions and angels (2:8, 16–23). Exactly what they taught is still discussed, since we know it only from this letter. The letter names Paul as its author. Many scholars think that a close disciple wrote it in his name, while others hold to Paul himself. The Church receives it as inspired Scripture in either case.
Structure.
Key words.
Verse by verse.
“Therefore do not let anyone condemn you in matters of food and drink or of observing festivals, new moons, or sabbaths.” (2:16)
This verse does not forbid fasting or feasts, which the Church herself keeps. It refuses to let anyone make these things the test of whether a person truly belongs to Christ.
“These are only a shadow of what is to come, but the substance belongs to Christ.” (2:17)
The feasts of Israel were God’s gift, and they prepared for what was to come. In Christ the reality has arrived. Our own fasting is of the same kind: a good and needed practice that serves him.
“and not holding fast to the head, from whom the whole body, nourished and held together by its ligaments and sinews, grows with a growth that is from God.” (2:19)
The picture is taken from the human body. Growth in holiness does not come from private visions. It comes from staying joined to Christ together with the rest of his body, the Church.
How the Church reads it.
The Catechism teaches that Christ is the head of the Church and that he provides for the growth of his body (CCC 792–794). It also says that Sunday fulfils the spiritual truth of the Jewish sabbath (CCC 2175). The Church has not stopped fasting because of this reading: Scripture and the Fathers insist on fasting, prayer and almsgiving as forms of inner conversion (CCC 1434). Their value lies in the turning of the heart.
Setting.
Jesus is on his way to Jerusalem (9:51). Just before this he has said that the kingdom must be received like a little child (18:15–17). Now a man of standing comes with a good question. Matthew, Mark and Luke all tell the story: Matthew calls him young (Matthew 19:20), Mark adds that Jesus looked at him and “loved him” (Mark 10:21), and only Luke calls him a ruler. Just after our reading, the listeners ask who then can be saved, and Jesus replies, “What is impossible for mortals is possible for God” (18:27).
Structure.
Key words.
Verse by verse.
“Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” (18:18)
Pope St John Paul II builds the first chapter of Veritatis Splendor on this story (in Matthew’s form) and sees in this man everyone who asks about the meaning of life (Veritatis Splendor 7, in substance).
“No one is good but God alone.” (18:19)
Jesus is not denying his own goodness. He is turning the man’s eyes to the source of all goodness. To ask about the good is finally to turn toward God (Veritatis Splendor 9, in substance). The reader who knows who Jesus is sees more in this sentence than the man could.
“There is still one thing lacking. Sell all that you own and distribute the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me.” (18:22)
Luke’s wording has “all”. The poor gain from this, but the point of the verse is its last word: follow. The giving clears the way for the following.
“it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle” (18:25)
This is a deliberate overstatement: the largest animal in the land and one of the smallest openings. A story about a small gate in Jerusalem called the “Needle’s Eye” is often told, but it has no support in ancient sources. The saying is meant to sound impossible, and that is why the next verses speak of what God can do.
How the Church reads it.
The Catechism says that this second call does not cancel the first: following Christ includes keeping the commandments (CCC 2053), and Jesus asks his disciples to prefer him to everything and everyone (CCC 2544). Hearing the same call in Matthew’s words, St Antony of Egypt gave away his land and went into the desert (St Athanasius, Life of Antony 2). Clement of Alexandria wrote a whole work on this passage, Who Is the Rich Man That Shall Be Saved?, arguing that what must go above all is the grip of possessions on the soul (in substance).
Must every Christian sell everything?
Not everyone in the same outward way. The Church sees in this call the root of the evangelical counsels, which some are called to live literally (CCC 915), and teaches that all the faithful are called to perfection of charity, each in their own state (CCC 2013). But no one is excused from the question. All are to direct their hearts so that attachment to riches does not get in the way of love (CCC 2545), and love for the poor is a duty for all (CCC 2443–2447).