Monday 30th August, 2010

Luke 4:16-30. They were astonished by his gracious words.

This is a moving scene presented in today’s gospel. Jesus comes home to his own people, sharing with them his teaching, so challenging and so new. To hear one of themselves speak words of such hope must have been very moving for them.

Yet how soon do the devils of doubt creep into their minds! They hear the son of the carpenter telling them strange and new things, such as God loving even non-Jews! How easy for them to become enraged.

We too often can react suspiciously to new things. We pray today, Lord, for an openness and respect for people. May we always be ready to listen to Jesus speaking to us in our hearts, and in the ideas and thoughts of others.

As far back as I can recall people have promoted Mexico as a cheap place to visit or live. As a kid I remember being in a doctors office and skimming a Travel magazine. It had an article on "Living in Mexico on $180 a month". My recollection is it showed a guy living in Cuernavaca in a house with a pool, a cook, a maid and a gardener for $180 per month. My daydreaming talents (which were considerable even then) took a new twist in direction. I stole the magazine and I would revisit it every chance I got and imagine the good life south of the border.

I spent a lot of time traveling in Mexico. The old See Mexico on $5 a day book was my guide of choice.

With inflation these numbers kept creeping upwards. Fortunately so did my income. There were books on living in Mexico on $400 a month, then later $800 a month. Much more recently was one on retiring to Mexico on Social Security.

Now I am retired and I have a home in Mexico. I get to discover whether my money really goes further or not. Guess what? Those dream weavers were largely right in their assessments.

As I have espoused in much more detailed posts previously, a couple can live comfortably in Mérida on less than $2000 per month. They could even live comfortably on $1000 per month if that were necessary.

I own my home in Mérida and I am nine blocks from the city's center. I have a lovely walled garden. Old pasta tile floors and AC when desired. A nice little pool. A weekly house cleaner, a weekly pool boy. We seldom eat in restaurants and do most of my own cooking.

The issue here isn't how big a house I can get for my resources or how many maids and chefs I can acquire or how pampered a life I can live, it's what type of life do I require in order to be fulfilled and complete and how much will that cost me?