A journalist from the Daily Telegraph asked Australian opposition leader, Tony Abbott, about the causes of “climate change”.

He said, “I think almost certainly man does have some impact, but it is important to respond in ways which improve the environment without damaging . . . .”

His answer was making so much sense until his last two words, which were . . . .

“. . . the Economy.”

He could have said “the Family”.

Or, even better, “ . . . the Spiritual Lives of our People.”

NOT the Economy.

Not just like that. The Economy does, of course, matter — but only insofar as it affects our families and our spiritual lives.

Of itself, “the Economy” is just another word for greed –- obsession with the Economy is what damages and destroys everything it touches.

* * *

Australian television watchers are familiar with the phrase “Who wants to be a Millionaire?”

It’s a sort of a non-question.

The thing not to forget is the fact that you cannot be a millionaire for long.

The longest you can keep your million is until you are dead.

That will not be very long.

* * *

Once you are in heaven or hell, it will make no difference whether you had that million or not.

Jesus Christ said, “What does it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, and suffer the loss of his soul? 

* * *

Mary MacKillop, one of Christ’s most faithful servants, took these words literally, and based her life upon them.

She wrote once to Bishop Sheil, “I longed for a religious life, one in which I could serve God and his poor . . . . I looked for poverty more like that practised in the early religious orders of the Church, poverty which, in its practice, would make a kind of reparation to God . . . .”