Loyola spoke of this. It was one of the things his disciples, the Jesuits, were supposed to do. One man, I forget his name, was exemplary in that when Loyola asked or volunteers to go to India. When someone got sick at the last moment he said, "Yes, I'll go." He was on the boat within a week. For most of us that would be impossible. Now the fact that he was single and had no family certainly helped. Few of us could be ready that fast. And remember there were several other Jesuits who did not jump up to volunteer. So yes, this man was exemplary.
I was thinking about this because it is so much fun to accumulate. But then at some point I have run out of room or lost the ability to keep track of all the stuff. Then I slow down the accumulation. I then try to cull items I don't need but that is much harder than getting them in the first place. This is all a part of having so much. My possessions run over, no doubt. When I die there will be so much for people to go through. I am concerned about that but I still have a hard time releasing things.
I couldn't even list all this things I have accumulated but a partial list is:
CD music,
Beta movies mostly taped off the TV (I still have them),
there are over 200 tapes with 2 or 3 movies on each tape most still work
VHS movies (only 100 of these),
DVD movies (second daughter bought most of these),
downloaded .avi movies,
cassette music,
old Redeemer albums
old Vineyard albums
old radio shows taped from the radio on cassette,
Oddessey radio shows (Focus on the Family) taped from the radio and some bought sets,
I have almost all of them until 2001 or so when
the kids positively got too old to care
books in several book cases,
Apple II software (I have so much of this stuff, mostly on 5.25" diskettes),
some restaurant matchboxes
many series of magazines that I have subscribed to (why?)
So I am certainly a negative example of holding things lightly.
