The texts from the Roman Catholic Lectionary today challenge us to explore Divine Presence in Nature and relationships that bring us life even as we are ready for our end days.
The reading from the Book of Wisdom presents the Foolishness of Nature Worship.
* [13:1–9] The author holds a relatively benign view of the efforts of the philosophers to come to know God from various natural phenomena. This is not a question of proving the existence of God in scholastic style. The author thinks that the beauty and might of the world should have pointed by analogy (v. 5) to the Maker. Instead, those “in ignorance of God” remained fixed on the elements (v. 2, three named, along with the stars). His Greek counterparts are not totally blameless; they should have gone further and acknowledged the creator of nature’s wonders (vv. 4–5). Cf. Rom 1:18–23; Acts 17:27–28. (Wisdom, CHAPTER 13, n.d.)
Psalm 19 praises God’s Glory in Creation and the Law.
* [Psalm 19] The heavenly elements of the world, now beautifully arranged, bespeak the power and wisdom of their creator (Ps 19:2–7). The creator’s wisdom is available to human beings in the law (Ps 19:8–11), toward which the psalmist prays to be open (Ps 19:12–14). The themes of light and speech unify the poem.
* [19:4] No speech, no words: the regular functioning of the heavens and the alternation of day and night inform human beings without words of the creator’s power and wisdom.
* [19:5] The sun: in other religious literature the sun is a judge and lawgiver since it sees all in its daily course; Ps 19:5b–7 form a transition to the law in Ps 19:8–11. The six synonyms for God’s revelation (Ps 19:8–11) are applied to the sun in comparable literature. (Psalms, PSALM 19, n.d.)
The Gospel of Luke presents the Day of the Son of Man
* [17:20–37] To the question of the Pharisees about the time of the coming of God’s kingdom, Jesus replies that the kingdom is among you (Lk 17:20–21). The emphasis has thus been shifted from an imminent observable coming of the kingdom to something that is already present in Jesus’ preaching and healing ministry. Luke has also appended further traditional sayings of Jesus about the unpredictable suddenness of the day of the Son of Man, and assures his readers that in spite of the delay of that day (Lk 12:45), it will bring judgment unexpectedly on those who do not continue to be vigilant.
* [17:21] Among you: the Greek preposition translated as among can also be translated as “within.” In the light of other statements in Luke’s gospel about the presence of the kingdom (see Lk 10:9, 11; 11:20) “among” is to be preferred.
* [17:36] The inclusion of Lk 17:36, “There will be two men in the field; one will be taken, the other left behind,” in some Western manuscripts appears to be a scribal assimilation to Mt 24:40. (Luke, CHAPTER 17, n.d.)
Jay Carney thinks of Pope Francis’s Laudato Si. In this groundbreaking encyclical, the Pope calls on people of good will to embrace an ecospirituality of “wonder and awe” by contemplating nature as reflective of the “inexhaustible riches of God” (LG 85-86). Francis argues that our modern ecological crisis has grown out of a fundamental disconnect with the natural world. Often distanced from the land and living in a technological world, we moderns can struggle to see God in the “greatness and beauty of created things,” or to marvel with the Psalmist at how “the heavens proclaim the glory of God.”
As Jesus reminds us in Luke’s gospel, Christians are to live in a spirit of eschatological hope and expectation. In her radical witness of other-centered service to the poor, St. Elizabeth of Hungary modeled this type of apocalyptic hope in the thirteenth century. Facing an apocalyptic environmental crisis of our own making, may we restless souls seek more faithful modes of witness to the Creator and Master Artisan of our most beautiful world. (Carney, 2023)
Don Schwager quotes “Those working in the field are sowing the Word of God,” by Ambrose of Milan, 339-397 A.D.
"'He that will be on the housetop, do not let him go down. He that will be in the field, do not let him turn back.' How may I understand what is the field unless Jesus himself teaches me? He says, 'No one putting his hand to the plough (plow) and looking back is fit for the kingdom of God' (Luke 9:62). The lazy person sits in the farmhouse, but the industrious person plants in the field. The weak are at the fireplace, but the strong are at the plough. The smell of a field is good, because the smell of Jacob is the smell of a full field (Genesis 27:27). A field is full of flowers. It is full of different fruits. Plough your field if you want to be sent to the kingdom of God. Let your field flower, fruitful with good rewards. Let there be a fruitful vine on the sides of your house and young olive plants around your table (Psalm 127:3). Already aware of its fertility, let your soul, sown with the Word of God and tilled by spiritual farming, say to Christ, 'Come, my brother, let us go out into the field' (Song of Solomon 7:11). Let him reply, 'I have come into my garden, my sister, my bride. I have gathered my vintage of myrrh' (Song of Solomon 5:1). What is better than the vintage of faith, by which the fruit of the resurrection is stored and the spring of eternal rejoicing is watered?" (excerpt from EXPOSITION OF THE GOSPEL OF LUKE 8.43.27) (Schwager, n.d.)
The Word Among Us Meditation on Wisdom 13:1-9 comments that today’s first reading invites us to consider “how far more excellent” God is when compared with anything he has created (Wisdom 13:3).
Let this truth sink in. The Creator of the universe loves you more than the wind, the sea, fire, and all the stars of the sky. He loves you so much that he emptied himself on the cross to save you. In that moment, shorn of any outward sign of his great power, he revealed the greatest thing of all: his love for you.
“Lord, just the thought of your love fills me with awe!” (Meditation on Wisdom 13:1-9, n.d.)
Friar Jude Winkler discusses the response of Paul in Galatians and Romans to the need to discern the Creator from Creation. Things may become gods in our lives even as Luke warns us of the uncertainty of the end of life. Friar Jude comments on the idea of “rapture” and the connection to 1 Thessalonians 4 as he underlines our need to be ready.
Fr. Richard Rohr, OFM, comments that the bottom line of the gospel is that most of us have to hit some kind of bottom before we even start the real spiritual journey. Up to that point, it is mostly religion. At the bottom, there is little time or interest in being totally practical, efficient, or revenue generating. We just want to breathe fresh air. The true gospel is always fresh air and spacious breathing room.
Soulful people are the necessary salt, yeast, and light needed to grow groups up (see Matthew 5:13–16, 13:33). Jesus does not demand that we be the whole meal, the full loaf, or the illuminated city itself, but we are to be the quiet undertow and overglow that makes all of these happen. This is why all institutions need second-half-of-life people in their ranks; just “two or three” in each organization are enough to keep them from total self-interest.
Our question now becomes, “How can I honor the legitimate needs of the first half of life, while creating space, vision, time, and grace for the second?” The holding of this tension is the very shape of wisdom. Only hermits and some retired people can almost totally forget the first and devote themselves totally to the second, but even they must eat, drink, and find housing and clothing! The art of being human is in uniting fruitful activity with a contemplative stance—not one or the other, but always both at the same time. (Rohr, 2023)
We are urged most recently by Pope Francis to cultivate a kinship relationship with Nature in which we experience the fullness of life through our relationship with the Creator.
References
Carney, J. (2023, November 17). Creighton U. Daily Reflection. Online Ministries. Retrieved November 17, 2023, from https://onlineministries.creighton.edu/CollaborativeMinistry/111723.html
Luke, CHAPTER 17. (n.d.). USCCB. Retrieved November 17, 2023, from https://bible.usccb.org/bible/luke/17?26
Meditation on Wisdom 13:1-9. (n.d.). The Word Among Us: Homepage. Retrieved November 17, 2023, from https://wau.org/meditations/2023/11/17/831533/
Psalms, PSALM 19. (n.d.). USCCB. Retrieved November 17, 2023, from https://bible.usccb.org/bible/psalms/19?2
Rohr, R. (2023, November 17). Honoring the First Half — Center for Action and Contemplation. Center for Action and Contemplation. Retrieved November 17, 2023, from https://cac.org/daily-meditations/honoring-the-first-half/
Schwager, D. (n.d.). One Will Be Taken and the Other Left. Daily Scripture Readings and Meditations – Daily Scripture Readings and Meditations. Retrieved November 17, 2023, https://www.dailyscripture.net/daily-meditation/?ds_year=2023&date=nov17
Wisdom, CHAPTER 13. (n.d.). USCCB. Retrieved November 17, 2023, from https://bible.usccb.org/bible/wisdom/13?1
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