09/08/2023

In the first of today's readings Hosea makes his revelation in nuptial imagery. God will treat a renewed Israel as if she were a bride. Tenderness, love and faithfulness are the words  that should epitomise our relationships with our spouses and here confirm the integrity and justice that is God's participation in the Covenant.

In the Psalm Israel is a young girl who sings with joy for she is to be taken to the King to bear children. It is a beautiful song but in 2023 we have to step back in time and place to understand the situation. It is imagery that would have touched the hearts of the worshippers as they sang it in synagogue and temple. Our Human Society has grown much beyond the tribal stage prevalent at the time of Hosea.

Jesus too uses bridal imagery in today's Gospel. Wisdom and foolishness are to be found in all of us. We are wise when we listen to the word of the Lord. "Listen" is what we all have to do. The really "wise" amongst us, however, can find themselves listening to the wisdom of their own intelligence and fall into a dream world of ideas that began by focusing on God but lost him in the pride of their own intelligence.

The bodies of today's Saint of the Holocaust and her sister were obliterated by the arrogance of mankind which had come about through not only carelessly "sleeping" and thus forgetting our purpose but also by defying the "bridegroom"who is still to come. 

Her intellectual "wisdom"was a thing to be marvelled at but she chose the path of Carmel searching for the still calm voice of Elijah and was killed by the monstrosity of human hatred which had taken a much more than "foolish" step and  welcomed not the Bridegroom but the Prince of Darkness into this world. 

In the lands that I know our souls still sleep on and, what is worse, many of the guardians of the oil to feed our lamps are also far from awake. The Grace of Father Son and Holy Spirit, however, never ceases to flow and the whole of humanity is still invited to join the wedding feast where all the martyrs especially those of the "chosen people", the ones who first received the Word, descendants of Mary's forefathers are all honoured guests.

Dear Lord I hope that my sentimentality is not offensive to you. I am touched by the stories of Edith and Maximilian. I know that I can never truly know you as they did, but that I can love and serve for these are how I can in freedom do your will. May Mary, Edith and all our forefathers in faith whose being touches You continue to channel to us the oil of grace that joins all our souls in the Spirit, The mystical body that is the Being but not necessarily the worldly structure of  your Church.