As Confucius agreeably says, defining one’s terms should prevent wasteful misdirections and misunderstandings. In the instance of stewardship as “a way of life,” I propose that for MODUS VIVENDI we might come nearer to its real meaning with a “way of living,” a much more dynamic rendering affording us a more active elbow-room or space for action. So much for Confucius and throat-clearing.
The stewardship triumvirate of TIME, TALENT and TREASURE, so alliteratively packaged, commands attention and maybe interest as well. The operative word here is the SHARING of these three items with the parish as a whole and its individual members severally. A tall order: but visions and missions cannot be otherwise, or what’s a Heaven for, as Browning reasonably asks?
The equitable sharing of TIME AND TALENT with stewardship’s ostensible recipients can be done through membership in the sanctioned organizations in the parish, joining and serving in various ministries (WESTYVFLA), prayer time, purposeful spending of our time and skills at home, in the workplace and wherever else we may be in our day’s 24 hours.
Offerings of the more efficacious third item (TREASURE) are primed to fund various project in the parish and in the broad Diocese of Antipolo in social services, pastoral programmes, catechetics, scholarships, feeding and livelihood projects, prison ministry, support for seminarians and so many others the TREASURE item might be “spread thin” as a consequence and therefore all the more justifying our seemingly undue emphasis on it as the bottomline of this stewardship activity, sharing our blessings with the more needy for as Jesus said “the poor shall always be with you” to His apostles.
