My father died several weeks ago, and I was left with the project of cleaning out his house. It is a daunting task to dismantle years’ worth of stuff. So many thoughts have come to me since I was unloading files, drawers, closets, and basements full of treasures and stuff.

I found my father’s wedding ring, sealed in a box; he was too frail to wear it in his last years. A simple gold band. Clippings from newspapers featuring one of my children in the second grade Christmas play. A drawing by a grandchild is preserved and cherished. My mother’s occasional recipe card, wayward from her green box where her other 3×5 index cards are stored. Shoes, looking ever so retro, in leather, in my father’s closet, with shoe trees inserted in some of his “good” shoes so they would be wearable on a fancy occasion. Bowls and cups from the basement that I recall from my youth. So much, so much stuff, each item seemed to be part of a story. We as human beings treasure items, but what are the dynamics of these collections? What do we hold dear and why?

Things in themselves are inanimate; that is, they have no meaning in themselves, but it is the humans who make the object worthy of a memory. Human beings make collections of their lives. I was overwhelmed by the sheer quantity of the stuff, but there was also the thought that these things were very much a part of who we are. They say a lot about how people live, what they see as crucial to their lives.

I think, however, our current culture seems to see things, perhaps beyond collections, beyond sentiment. Things fuel an economic vista that is promoted by each of us being consumers. Currently, our government is negotiating trade deals with our trading partners that benefit the economy, as we are the world’s leading consumers. Things and the acquisition of things have taken on an almost magical hold onto the culture. We are a nation of fashion; we want the latest style, device, or craze. Not only actual things, but celebrities are all selling if not a thing, then a lifestyle. We are a nation connected to social media, constantly selling things that make the items look so good as to enchant us into wanting them. It will alter our social standing, health, or ability to be popular. Often, within a short period of time, another item, pitch, or product takes its place to charm us into buying it. It seems to me that today, most people live from one fad to the next. Things in themselves cannot make us want them; it is we who see them and invest in these objects, prompted by advertisement or hype that hook into our human needs and desires, that create a consumer mentality. We are chasing something inside of us, and the item fills the need. Is this wrong? On the surface, no, but when we cannot see our pathway to the truth of our lives, it can produce a person who lacks depth. That is a person who knows nothing else but filling their lives with “things”.

Things are here to serve us, not the other way round. The essential values found in the abstract — compassion, forgiveness, and love, these monumental building blocks of the human spirit — are shut out when things rule, producing a temporary person.

I realized I’d started this small essay about my father’s house, where I was unloading stuff. But we are all collectors; things are infused with memory. I read a story not too long ago about a son trying to help his elderly father clean out his basement. They went downstairs, and he was ready to unload golf clubs, books, and furniture. His father became very distressed, and they left the basement. The son did not know why the basement cleaning had gone so wrong. Later that evening, as he was driving home, he realized what had happened. His father did not want to get rid of his golf clubs or anything in the basement because it would deprive him of the chance to use them someday. In short, his father was too elderly to use them, but he clung to the potential of someday golfing again. He refused the idea that he was too old. Many of us have similar situations. in our basements: large pots my mother used for cooking family dinners, which she could not part with for her memories of her family sitting around the table and the joy of seeing her children and her grandchildren eating what she had prepared for them. She could not do it in her later years, but the pots were there when she could again serve her family with a dinner.

My takeaway from my cleaning experience is that “things” serve a purpose, but our spiritual life is more important; we must balance the material world with the spiritual, which is the aim of our lives. All the material I was getting rid of –the memories — were gone; the stuff I was removing had turned back into inanimate objects, their meaning now removed. Stuff cannot rule us; we must rule things. Collections and sentiment will always exist, but we as humans are meant for heaven. Our soul is our worth, not things.

“For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world, yet forfeits his soul? Or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?”(Matthew 16:26)