After the Constitution of the United States was established and had the appearance of permanency, Benjamin Franklin once famously said that nothing can be certain in life except paying taxes and death.

My wife does an excellent job at managing our family finances. She takes care of balancing the checkbook, paying bills, preparing everything for the filing of our annual tax return, and keeping me informed about where everything stands. I am blessed by her work in this regard.

Before we were married, I had that task to do for myself. I never balanced the checkbook, and I would always just round up what I paid in bills, feeling comfortable that I would never bounce a check and knowing that I had a hidden treasure for use on a rainy day.

Such sloppy attention to detail did cause issues when trying to tie everything together at tax filing time. This method of bookkeeping also provided no way of making sure the bank did not make any mistakes on their end.

I mention this as we are preparing to do our taxes this week. I am grateful to know that everything is in order for that filing.

All of this made me reflect on the effort that is put into such preparation, and having the peace of mind in knowing everything is correct and in order.

I found myself thinking that, if we each do such preparation work annually for taxes, then we should do the same thing for our final accounting with our loving Lord that will occur at the end of our lives. Do we take account of our shortcomings and say a daily Act of Contrition, or do we say we will just do that the next time we go to the confessional? Do we take advantage of the special graces and forgiveness we obtain in the Sacrament of Reconciliation?

As Benjamin Franklin said so eloquently, death is certain in life. Are we prepared? Failing to prepare, like failing to pay taxes, has consequences that we should avoid at all costs.   

By: Deacon Tom Gryzbek