“The only thing we take with us when we die is what we have given away.”

Thus Abp Sartain quoted the man himself in his homily for Cdl George.

If this seems familiar, it should, Oscar Hammerstein said, (through Maria Rainer,) pretty much the same thing - "love isn't love 'til you give it away."

And, as long as we're quoting, the great theological team of Lennon and McCartney told us, "all you need is love."

Am I mocking any of them? I am not.

Because as John told the recipients of his first letter,  and Benedict reminded us in his first encyclical, "God is love."

And isn't He Whose very Self is Love all we need?

And we will be called to account, on the Last Day for what we did with what He gave_

The one who had received the one talent came forward and said, ‘Master, I knew you were a demanding person, harvesting where you did not plant and gathering where you did not scatter;
so out of fear I went off and buried your talent in the ground. Here it is back.’
His master said to him in reply, ‘You wicked, lazy servant!* So you knew that I harvest where I did not plant and gather where I did not scatter?
Should you not then have put my money in the bank so that I could have got it back with interest on my return?

Great truths always permit of many different expressions.