26th Sunday after Pentecost; Our Venerable Father Patapius
Nativity Fast.
Read
Ephesians 5:9-19; Luke 12:16-21
Brothers and sisters, St. Nicholas is a very loved saint in our Church. Every Thursday of the year is devoted in veneration of this bishop. Most iconostases have a dedicated spot for him. At times the faithful have even gone too far and in their love for him has said things like “God, please ask St. Nicholas to help me” or “if anything happened to God, at least we will have St. Nicholas!” This saint is the patron of many things, including pawnshops! How could this jolly old fellow be known as the patron saint of such seedy businesses? In the Middle Ages, montes pietatius were charities similar to urban food banks. They were created as an alternative to loan sharks. These charities provided low-interest loans to poor families and were actually started by the Franciscans. They became widespread throughout Europe in 1300. The symbol of the pawn shops were three gold coins in three purses, reminiscent of the dowries that St. Nicholas secretly provided for three daughters of a nobleman, saving them from lives of destitution and prostitution. Sadly, we can see that over time pawnshops, originally created for good, now exist to prey on the families they were originally created to protect.
St. Nicholas is the opposite of the rich fool we read about in the Gospel today. Both were rich. But the rich fool saw money as an end, while St. Nicholas knew it to be a means. One used his money to fool himself into false worldly security, while the other used it to protect the innocence of those he loved by giving generously, knowing that his true treasure in this life and the next, would only be found in Christ. Christian saints throughout the ages have shown that it is never foolish to trade that which they cannot keep for that which they can never lose!
Brothers and sisters, let us not fall back into the pawnshop mentality and cheapen the amazing vocation we have been given! Refuse to surrender our amazing St. Nicholas for a Santa of consumerism and worldly security. Let us learn from St. Nicholas how to love to the point that we too can be caught being secretly generous!