In today’s reading from Matthew’s Gospel, Jesus asks, “What does it profit you if you gain the whole world but suffer the loss of your own soul?” Man’s goal does not consist of accumulating worldly goods; these are only a means to an end. Man’s last end, his ultimate goal, is God himself; he possesses God in advance, as it were, here on earth through grace and possesses him fully and forever in heaven. St. Thomas Aquinas reminds us that “the least good of grace is superior to the natural good of the entire universe.” Fr. Ron Rolheiser asks, “What does it mean to lose your soul in this world?” Philosophy speaks of the soul as immaterial and spiritual. This double principle is inside every living being: the principle of life and energy inside us and the principle of integration. Essentially, the soul is the fire inside us, giving us life and energy and the glue that holds us together. We can have our vitality and energy go dead or become unglued and fall apart; in either case, we lose our souls. We lose our souls in opposite ways; thus, the minding of the soul is a refined alchemy that has to know when to heat things up and cool things down. What’s healthy for my soul depends a lot upon what I’m struggling with: Am I losing my soul because I’m losing vitality, energy, hope, and graciousness in my life? Am I becoming a person who’s painful to be around? Or, conversely, am I full of life and energy but so full of it that I am falling apart, losing my sense of self? Does my soul need more fire, something to rekindle its energy? Does my soul have too much fire and need some cooling down and glue? After we die, we can go to heaven or hell. That’s one way of speaking about losing or saving our souls. But Christian theology also teaches that heaven and hell start here in this life. We can lose our souls by not having enough fire or losing them by not having enough glue.