Authenticity and Wisdom

Friar Jude Winkler comments today on the texts from the Roman Catholic Lectionary describing the passages from the Book of Proverbs and the Gospel of Luke as wisdom writings. This type of writing offers us short and powerful suggestions for how to live. We are encouraged to live in consideration of the needs of our neighbour and to be quick to respond when we are able to assist them. The rationalizations that they can wait, I will attend to that later or someone else will take care of that are not the path of the righteous person. Our daily lives put us in the position of needing to be humble to accept that we too will be in the position of being put off, deferred and ignored. The psalmist answers a question (Psalm 15:1)” O Lord, who may abide in your tent? Who may dwell on your holy hill?” with verses which call us to treat our neighbour in an open, fair and respectful manner. We need to avoid speaking ill of others. The authentic desire for intimacy with the Divine is witnessed, according to the Gospel of Luke, by those who let their light shine. Friar Jude encourages us to hear the need to be transparent and authentic in our dealings with others in this text. The gifts we have from God are to be used in authentic action to show love. We hear this, we respond and our openness to be gift to others increases. We ignore this and act for self or in devious ways and our ability to be gift to others decreases. “Fake it till you make it” is the antithesis of the message from Scripture today.