It is an interesting experience to travel by air these days. In truth I did not find it all that unpleasant. Planes and airports are a little less crowded. Airline staff and passengers seem to be very prudent in their actions. Folks are being vigilant.
It’s easy to be prudent and vigilant in the midst of a pandemic when the consequences are more immediate. Much less so at other times. We get lazy. So in her wisdom, as we near the end of Ordinary Time, the Church asks us to contemplate the end of all time, when at the end of the age, Christ will come to judge the living and the dead. Make no mistake about it, Christ is coming. We need to be ready. Paul
This weekend, we are invited to contemplate virtues of wisdom, prudence and vigilance.
Let’s talk about wisdom first.
First of all, what is it?
In short, Wisdom is insight gained from experience,
So how does one become wise? A couple of ways, I think.
1. Live long enough to gain lots of experience, pay attention and learn from it, so that it may be useful in the future, or
2. Seek out wise people, either in person or in literature and learn from them.
Now there are two cautions here.
First, experience of itself does not necessarily impart wisdom. As the writer of the Book of Wisdom tells us, very plainly. Wisdom is readily available to those who seek her…but you have to seek her!
Here is where contemplation and self-reflection comes into the equation if one is to learn from experience and become truly wise.
This is perhaps one of big mistakes we make as a society today in raising our children. I can’t count how many times I have heard a parent say to me, “I want my kid to experience this, or experience that.” That’s fine, I suppose, but we have to realize that their job is only half complete. How do we help our children reflect on their experiences and learn from them. In my experience, our young people are so busy getting all these experiences that they don’t have time to learn anything from them. The result is exhausted, frustrated young people.
Teach your children values first, and then the experiences they have will have a context that will allow them to grow in wisdom.
Second caution, wisdom should not be confused with knowledge; by this I mean the simple accumulation of information. The world is full of educated, unreflected fools.
As the saying goes, knowledge is knowing that a tomato is a fruit. Wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad.
Wisdom needs to be sought. It should be the goal of education because it leads to the second virtue in our meditation today, namely prudence.
Simply put, prudence is being able to do the right thing at the right time.
Don’t you wish you had perfect prudence- to always do the right thing at the right time?
The wise person is prudent.
This implies that we must be able to discern the signs of the times.
And to know what is right, so that we may do it.
Do you see now how prudence is born of wisdom?
Become wise, so that you may not act foolishly.
So now let’s look at the wise and foolish virgins that Our Lord tells us about in today’s gospel.
The parable is set at the city gates as the maidens await the arrival of the groom with his bride for the wedding feast.
What’s that all about?
In ancient semitic culture, the customs surrounding marriage had four stages.
1. the contract
2. the betrothal
3. the transfer of the bride to the house of the groom
4. the wedding feast
First of all, you seldom married someone from your own village. This for the simple reason that they found that if they did so, eventually the kids would not turn out right as the gene pool was just too small.
The contract was pounded out between the heads of the two households. This could happen when the children were infants, but usually before puberty. It was done with much fanfare and ritual arguing. Then they had a party to celebrate.
The betrothal usually came in mid-adolescence. A rabbi or synagogue official would bless the anticipated union with formulary prayers of anticipation, blessing the future union. And then they would have a party. (Do you see a pattern developing here?)
Then at the appropriate time some years later, the bridegroom would travel to the village of the bride and bring her back to his own house. The bride was dressed in the finest her family could afford and presented with great pomp and circumstance. Travel being what it was in those days, it might take several hours or several days to get back to the bridegroom’s village. In the meantime, the bridal party would prepare to receive the couple with great fanfare. In the day, it would mean flower laurels, juniper branches, and a huge procession from the gates of the town to his house. If at light, it would involve torches and lamps, such as the ten virgins were carrying. He could show up at any time and you had to be ready to receive him and his bride.
And that’s the point.
When the Kingdom of Heaven arrives, it is expected, but you are not quite sure when that will be.
Thus, the wise and prudent person is vigilant. He or she is prepared, like the wise virgins who brought the extra oil.
So we too need to be prepared. But how?
It’s important to remember that the Kingdom comes in two ways,
1. In the ordinariness of everyday life
2. definitively at the end of the age, when all things are consummated in Christ.
So we have to be prepared for both ways.
The Kingdom of Heaven may come to us in prayer, or in the kindness or keen insight of another person.
If we are wise, we will be vigilant, and act prudently.
It may come to us in the hungry, the thirsty, the homeless, the sick, the imprisoned, those who mourn, or the poor. (Yes, those are the corporal works of mercy.)
If we are wise, we will be vigilant, and act prudently.
It may come to us in the ignorant, the doubtful, the sinner, those who do us harm or offend us, in the afflicted, or any who need our prayers, both living dead. (the spiritual works of mercy)
If we are wise, we will be vigilant, and act prudently.
If we are prepared to recognize Christ in the midst in the ordinariness of everyday life, how much more will we be prepared for his coming at the end of the age, and be recognized by him.
Wisdom, prudence and vigilance. These are the virtues by which we prepare for the coming of the kingdom. Like those wise ones who await the bridegroom with their lamps alight, let us keep the flame of faith alive in our hearts “as we await the blessed hope, and the coming of our Savior, Jesus Christ.”