Chris Heller [This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.]
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Elizabeth Teixeira
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Tuesday, November 10, 2020 7:34 PM
Matthew 25: 1-13 – Thirty-Second Sunday in Ordinary Time - November 8, 2020
Thousands of pilgrims filled St. Peter’s Square on April 9, 2014. Pope Francis began a series of teachings on the Holy Spirit, starting with the Holy Spirit and the gift of wisdom. Surrounded by Church officials & TV cameras, the pope began his address rather deliberately as usual, delivering his prepared text as the audience silently nodded along to his theological thinking.
Then, very abruptly he pushed away his notes and departed from the text, looked up, and in Francis’ custom, asked a question of the crowd. The question sounded something like this: “Imagine a mother running around after her children all day, attending to their every need. Eventually the mother gets tired, loses her patience, and starts scolding her child. Is THAT wisdom?” The crowd, caught off guard by the question, gave barely an audible response. With even MORE energy, the Pope asked yet again: “Scolding children—I ask you—is THIS wisdom? What do you say: Is THIS wisdom or not?” Wasting no time, he shot back with his OWN answer: “No!”
Pope Francis then contrasted wisdom with scolding. Wisdom happens when a tired mother takes her child gently aside, addressing the child patiently and lovingly. That is what GOD’S wisdom looks like. During this teaching, Pope Francis offered the Church a definition of wisdom that today we hear unfolding in our Scriptures. He said: “Wisdom is precisely this: It is the grace of being able to see everything, and everyone, with the eyes of God. This is wisdom.”
When we apply the virtue of wisdom to the Gospel parable that Jesus tells this week, to be wise is to be aware of our intimate relationship with God, AND to be ready at a moment’s notice to shift gears: to change speed or even direction, under the guidance of that most loving God. The foolish and the wise virgins in the Gospel are distinguished by ONE quality: 5 of them are ready to follow, whenever & wherever our Master would take them, while 5 are NOT ready at all. And you and I know WHO is WHO!
It’s especially important to remember this when people challenge US: people have suggested over the years that this is a BOGUS parable: that Jesus could have simply told the 5 wise virgins to share some oil with the 5 foolish ones, and everything would have been all right. THAT perspective is actually a good example of people in the 21st century trying to assess what was going on in the first century by our own modern standards. See, the TEN virgins were called: as a group, they were assigned ONLY ONE TASK: to be ready to light the way for the groom WHENEVERY HE ARRIVED! They were charged with being attentive and focused and alert. NOTHING ELSE MATTERED. In plenty of other parables, Jesus talks about sharing: this is NOT one in which sharing is the predominant theme. So, to suggest that the wise ones should have been sharing THEIR oil with the foolish ones is to suggest that the WISE oils should have been DISLOYAL to the groom, DISRESPECTFUL to the groom’s wishes, and more: DISHONORABLE to the groom’s plan for his wedding night.
So, let US take advantage of God’s call and God’s initiative in reaching out to us today. Let’s tell the deep-down truth: if there is a person, place or thing that gets in the way of my giving myself, my heart, or my life completely to God, God’s invitation today might be just the impetus we need to make a decision re: wisdom, right here at the Eucharist. Let us not waste ANY opportunity here at Mass where Christ, Son of God & Son of Mary, gives us a foretaste of the banquet that is to come.