Dear Friends,
The early darkness of standard time has descended on our
land. In delicious contrast, today’s Gospel is from Matthew 25 where Jesus tells the
story of the bridesmaids who were sent out into the night with oil lamps to be
kept burning while waiting for the bridegroom to come.
In our day, bridesmaids are family members or friends who
precede the bride up the aisle. They assist her in a variety of ways and add to
the loveliness of the occasion. In Jesus’ time, however bridesmaids had one
outstanding duty – namely, to light the way as they escorted the bridegroom to
his bride. Each woman chosen to be a bridesmaid knew she had to bring a lamp
and enough oil to see to her duty.
Jesus’ hearers knew that if the bridegroom was late, he was
with the bride’s father, working out the details of her dowry. The longer the
negotiations took, the higher in esteem the bride was said to be. In a subtle
way, Jesus showed how much he valued women, for as he tells it, the negotiations
took the better part of the night.
When the word came that the bridegroom was on his way, there
was a scramble among the sleepy-eyed bridesmaids. Some of them had remembered
to bring extra oil. Some forgot or made a poor judgment about how much oil was
required.
The five wise bridesmaids had to face a difficult choice.
They could light the way for the bridegroom and risk losing the friendship of
their unprepared companions, or they could share their oil and have it run out
for all of them. In choosing not to share but to be ready to escort the
bridegroom, the five wise bridesmaids
also chose to live with the tension their refusal created.
We know about tension. Some tension is good, like tension
that keeps us alert on the highways, competent in our professional lives and
physically at our peak, the tension of being a good spouse and parent, a good
Christian and a good citizen. All of these tensions are exacerbated these
pandemic days.
We too need a lot of oil for our lamps so that we can
function meaningfully in the months ahead, mostly by staying the course of our
lives. Archbishop Pierbattista Pizzaballa, has just recently been named to
Latin patriarch of Jerusalem. That means he is in charge of making strong the
Roman Catholic Church of Jerusalem. In describing what Pope Francis asked the
archbishop to do is to “stay” where he was in a new role. To stay.
Archbishop Pizzaballa wrote to the people: “{Stay} is a verb
of matured patience, of watchful waiting, of daily and serious fidelity.” He
then invited his flock “to remain with me, in the same decision.”
As today’s oil bearers, you and I are called to stay in the
moment, stay with the call, stay in whatever ways we need to, despite the
temptations to do otherwise.
Today’s first reading teaches us that wisdom so generously
offers us none other than God’s Spirit, given to help us make life-giving,
life-sustaining choices in the face of the tensions of life.
Bring along enough oil. Stay the course.
~ Sister Joan Sobala
