Fr. Matthias Neuman's Homily for the 32nd Sunday of Ordinary Time

Readings: Wis 6:12-16; 1 Thess 4:13-18; Mt 25:1-13

One of my longstanding memories of grade school years at St. Mary’s in Huntingburg is belonging to the Boy Scouts. St. Mary’s had its own Scout troop. The Scouts provided many vital activities for young boys. The Scouts tried to encourage boys to become helpful and productive members of society. You could learn various skills by acquiring merit badges. You learned to appreciate nature by camping out on weekends. Above all, you were taught to "be prepared" to deal with any kind of challenging situation that might arise. The traditional example was helping an elderly lady to cross a street. There were, of course, some aspects about the Boy Scouts that seemed contradictory. For example, we had a wonderful Scout cabin at St. Mary’s that served as our private meeting place. But the inside of the cabin was decorated with various items that had been stolen from different places the Scouts had camped through the years— road signs with place names were preferred. Nonetheless, the overall purpose of the Scouts was the motto, Be Prepared, to deal with anything.

From this perspective Jesus appears to be a distant precursor of the Scouts. One aspect of his teaching is to "Be Prepared," as shown in today’s gospel story about the foolish and wise virgins. There are, of course, quite different purposes between Jesus and the Scouts. The Scouts wanted to be prepared to be a helpful member of society. Jesus message of "Be Prepared," aims at expecting the sudden coming of the Kingdom of God. St. Benedict has his own version of "be prepared" in his admonition to "keep death daily before one’s eyes."

In each case "be prepared" addresses the common supposition we often have that each day is going to go pretty much as we expect it to. And many days they do. But sometimes things change—suddenly and drastically. Frequently it’s something you never saw coming. I think of that in the mornings when I’m watching the news on TV, seeing car accidents that are changing the lives of people forever—in ways they probably never thought of. I never thought my severe back problems would return after I gave up golf. But here they are and I am trying to cope with a new direction in life. On a larger scale most Catholics in the 1960s never saw the Second Vatican Council coming. We see now what the last fifty years in the Church have been like. In no case is it ever easy.

We might consider this an essential step in developing a solid spirituality—that from time to time we need to stop and consider all that we take for granted in life and faith and consider that anything might change radically. And that includes our relationship with God and with Jesus Christ. These are very special areas where we do like to get into a "comfort zone." We like to get a particular style of prayer that we feel comfortable with and then just stay there. Any kind of change can really upset us. And often our first reaction to change is to think that something is wrong with us or somehow God has changed attitudes towards us. We find ourselves swimming in the dark, not knowing which way to turn. But a spirituality of an instability moment might help us better in our initial response. By an instability moment I mean, when a shocking change occurs in our lives, we might recognize that big changes have come upon us and realize that we are going to have to do some serious rearranging in our lives. And God, in fact, deals with us that way. We have heard so often the biblical saying from the prophet Isaiah, "My thoughts are not your thoughts, and your ways are not my ways, says the Lord." (55:10) There are times when we really, really have to take that to heart.