Friends
Peace be with you.
A number of years ago, I was assigned to an Irish parish and and I was asked, relatively early into the assignment, to do a burial. In case you don’t know, in general, Irish parishes tend to want their cemetery in a different location than the parish church. Luxemburger and German parishes, on the other hand, tend to want the cemetery right next to the church. Think of St. Joe’s in Bellevue, for instance, versus Sts. Peter and Paul, St. Donatus, and St. Catherine. There was a church in the St. Joe Cemetery at one point roughly where the columbarium are located today but, by 1901, the largely Irish population that attended that church moved it blocks away. It’s my understanding that, at one point, Sts. Peter and Paul in Springbrook was located East of town but, when they decided to move the church into the center of town, rather than continuing to bury people out there, they started a new cemetery right around the new church. Okay, you get the picture.
So, I’m supposed to go to a cemetery that isn’t right next to the church but, halfway there, I realized I didn’t know where the cemetery was. I was supposed to meet the funeral home director at the funeral home and he would lead me out there but I got delayed and was a little late and missed the procession to the cemetery. I tried to find it on google maps to no avail. I asked around town and got the kind of directions that help locals. “Take the Frankville highway until you see where the windmill used to be on old Slim Jackson’s farm…” I got so lost and had absolutely no luck in finding anyone who could help me get there that I eventually gave up and went home. I no more than walked through the door when the funeral home director called and asked me why I didn’t show up. I told him everything I just told you and he said, “Well, why didn’t you just wait at the funeral home? You should have known I was going to come back and get you.” I thought to myself, “Should I?” and just apologized and said I’d do better in the future.
I think that’s why I have a certain sympathy for the foolish virgins in the gospel today. I am not always good about planning ahead and being ready for whatever is to come. So, it’s probably good to focus our attention on being wise, a characteristic described rather well in the first reading for today. Now, I know some of you may have noticed rather quickly that wisdom is portrayed as a woman. You may think that’s because only women are wise but it is a little more complicated than that. In the language at the time, God is portrayed as a man and lady wisdom is portrayed as God’s partner, his coworker. The book from which this passage comes, entitled Wisdom or the Wisdom of Solomon, was probably written 100 or 200 years before the birth of Jesus. It’s one of those books that is found in the Catholic Bible but not in Protestant Bibles. It’s a book all about the search for wisdom. What’s interesting is that, at the time of its writing, the Jewish people would have been interacting, with the Greek world, a world of violence, yes, but also a world of philosophers like Plato and Aristotle. So, part of what the author is doing is saying that it’s not just the Greeks who have wisdom, we do too. It’s just that, unlike the Greeks who believe you have to go on a long and arduous journey searching for wisdom, “She hastens to make herself known in anticipation of their desire.” Even before we search for wisdom, she is making herself known to us. That’s because, for believers, God existed before us and wisdom, often associated with the Holy Spirit, existed before us and has been seeking us out. That’s why the first reading says, “(wisdom) makes her own rounds, seeking those worthy of her, and graciously appears to them in the ways, and meets them with all solicitude.”
Isn’t that great? I hope it’s relieving. Instead of having to search in all kinds of places for the wisdom of God, God is searching for us. This really is something that makes Christianity different from most other religions; We have a God who searches for us. Knowing this, it should affect our prayer. Bishop Barron suggests, quite rightly, that we take five minutes a day to remind ourselves that God is looking for you and invite God into our hearts. Don’t be like me, driving all over looking for God. Just sit and be still and let God find you. Also, think about those areas of your life that you feel like you have to control. Recently, I have realized that I’m getting in trouble in this assignment because I’ve started thinking that, if I don’t do some things, they aren’t going to get done. I have to call this meeting because I can’t trust the leadership to do so. I have to set the agenda because, if they do, we’ll never get anything done. I have to be the one to turn the lights off in church or we’ll waste all kinds of electricity. Whenever we make ourselves indispensable in a situation, we lose sight that God is the one who is in charge. It’s okay to ask for help. In fact, it’s a good reminder that we need to take time to trust in others and search out others for their help, if for no other reason than because we need to be able to take time each day to be found by God and we can’t do that when we feel like we have to be in charge of everything. Of what use is a creator when we feel like we need to create everything or it just won’t get done right.
In the end, it’s easy to find wisdom. We just have to let the Father find us and there she is too.
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