Tag Archives: Book of Wisdom

20th Sunday B: Taste and See

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I stopped for something to eat the other day along the seashore at Montauk, Long Island, a place I stopped by chance. “We have a nice fish chowder, everything fresh from near here,” the waitress said, so I ordered the fish chowder. Couldn’t have been better, better than anything I expected.

Our first reading today for Sunday Mass is about a meal that’s even better, better than we could expect or plan for. Someone wise provides it. It’s not a meal for just one or two; we’re all invited to the table. Amazingly, it’s free; we don’t have to pay for it.

Listen again to the Book of Wisdom: “Whoever is simple turn in here; to the one who lacks understanding, she says, Come eat my food and drink of the wine I have mixed.”

“Whoever is simple turn in here.” I suppose that means whoever is hungry, whoever is weary, whoever is burdened, come and eat. Aren’t those the ones Jesus felt compassion for. “Come to me, and I will refresh you,” he said. Don’t we qualify for an invitation like this? His refreshment is beyond what earthy food or drink can bring.

Where can we find this meal, except in the Eucharist, where “we taste and see the goodness of the Lord.” A goodness beyond our expectations.

“Take and eat, this is my body.” “Take and eat, this is my blood.” The people in today’s gospel (John 6,51-58) are repulsed by Jesus when he says “unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink of his blood you cannot have life in you. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life and I will raise him on the last day.”

“How can he give us his flesh to eat and his blood to drink?” They take his words in too narrow a way. Who tells us to do this? Who’s the One who offers us his body and blood? The Lord of all, who made all things. He contains all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. He’s the Lord of life who gives life. He promises resurrection, while knowing the reality of our death.

No other meal can compare to this. No other food can satisfy us; no other drink can quench our thirst .

I Will Bless The Lord At All Times

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I’m reading a biography of Woodrow Wilson, the 28th president of the United States from 1913 till 1921, who led the country through the brutal years of the First World War, which we remembered yesterday, November 11, Armistice Day.

Wilson was a deeply religious man, the son of a Presbyterian pastor, a wonderful writer and an eloquent speaker. Biographers today tend to use the tools of psychology to explain their subjects but the biographer of this book explains Wilson mostly through his religious beliefs– a refreshing approach.
{ Woodrow Wilson, A Life for World Peace, Jan Willem Shulte Nordholt, Berkeley. Ca. 1991}

Wilson believed that God was good, that people were good, that God was calling all nations to live in peace, and that God had given our country, the United States, a providential role among the family of nations, as a beacon of goodness and righteousness.

He was too much of an optimist, his biographer says. He didn’t see the dark side of humanity or the dark side of our own country. He thought that if you appealed to the better nature of people they would do the right thing. He couldn’t believe people would throw themselves into an awful war, or America could exploit other nations. He saw the world as the beautiful world described by Wordsworth in his poems, not a world devastated by storms (like the one that just struck the Philippines}. He was too optimistic, a Christian without the cross.

And that caused him to underestimate evil and to overestimate political solutions and possibilities. He saw the world incompletely. How many Christians are like him today?

“I will bless the Lord at all times.” (Psalm 34) The psalm is the response to our reading from the Book of Wisdom at today’s Mass; God is with us at all times, good and bad, it says. No need to be blind to evils like death and destruction, the psalm continues. “The Lord has eyes for the just, and ears for their cry… The Lord confronts the evildoers…The Lord is close to the brokenhearted and those who are crushed in spirit he saves.” The Lord is with us in bad times as well as good.

We can “bless the Lord at all times.”