Work in Good Faith

We all have talents special and proper to us; and they are means to our self-dignity. Often we hide, ignore, and reject our talents because of other, often negative, factors that play on us, like, the other does not deserve to get what he has, the other is impure, or the leader is an unjust man like here in Luke 19: 11-28. The man who went to get crowned as a king was not the people’s favourite. He was an exacting person, and he claims ownership of what is not his. The servant had enough excuses to be justified for not using the talents. But the gospel does not accept them. The servant who buried his money lost his chance to better his life.

In law there is a beneficial phrase, “in good faith’; meaning, one does his work assuming goodness, and truthfulness of he other. The doer does not spend too much time in thinking and analysing; he/she just keeps doing the good that he/she can do.

The piercing question of the master in this gospel passage is, what have you done with what I have entrusted to you? You might have had a thousand assumptions, you might have a thousand excuses, but what happened to the one thing that the master had entrusted you with? How painful it would be to know that the hungry person on the street is still hungry because you haven’t done your work; that the naked person is still naked because you haven’t done your work; that a person is in the prison because you haven’t done you work; that thousands around us are still illiterate because you haven’t done your work; that wars and conflicts are destroying our planet because you haven’t done your work? The list could go on.

Do not think too much. Work with what is at hand. Perhaps with the result of your work, the equations can change. A small good deed can influence the universe. If we avoid doing it we leave a vacuum in the creation. Life is all about being faithful to one’s own vocation, in good faith.

At times with our assumptions we may be stopping the good that can happen or we may be doing the wrong things. Some times an apparently great idea may stop us from discerning the best idea; and sometimes an apparently best idea may stop us from discerning the right one. Once an author said to his friend, “It took me ten years to discover that I had absolutely no talent for writing literature.” “So you gave up?” said the friend. The author replied, “Oh, no; by that time I was too famous.”

Remember that Jesus said this parable in the context of the coming of God’s Kingdom. They all thought it is coming soon. Perhaps Jesus is correcting them saying, you don't wait for it to come, but we have to work towards its realisation. In this gospel, waiting means to work for it to be realised. And from those who do not work towards realising something greater, even the little that they have will be taken away. As it is said, buried seeds might sprout, buried talents never.

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