What does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses his soul?

Catholic Homilies by Fr Linus Clovis

What do we have that has not been given us? There is only one thing that is essentially our own, and that of course is our sins. Everything else is a gift to us, we begin with the gift of life. This is the most basic, this is the fundamental gift. If we do not have life, if we never existed we cannot possess any other gift. So, once God had brought us, as is said, loved us into existence; because He loves everything He creates. Once He’s loved us into existence, He then adds gifts to us. The gifts are those of the body and then He adds those of the soul. Then those of the spirit. We are meant to use these gifts as stewards, we are not lords or masters of the gifts God has given us, but we are to use them as stewards. That means we are to use them for the greater glory of God, for the assistance and the help of our neighbour, and of course for the salvation of souls. If we are to do this, we must have a clear vision of what we are and who we are. What are we? We are creatures, created by God and therefore dependent upon Him. Who are we? We are children of God, sons and daughters, brought into the very household of God, called to share the eternal banquet that the Father has prepared for us, since the foundation of the world. We can only keep this vision of what we are and who we are, we can only keep this vision in mind if we really understand ourselves. Understanding ourselves in as much as, our time here on Earth is limited and that we have to answer for each and every day that we are here. If our vision of who we are and what we are shifts to what we possess and in the Gospel our Lord speaks specifically about wealth and we start to evaluate ourselves according to what we possess, we are going to be in serious trouble. ‘What does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses his soul?’ Now we shouldn’t think that money, that tainted thing is not in itself evil, because God has created wealth. He has loaned it to us as stewards… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.