💖 HOMILY - NOVEMBER 17 💖

First Reading - Wisdom 13:1-9

Gospel - Luke 17:26-37

We may have used the following statement quite often: "I don't know about this or I didn't know about this." This statement shows our ignorance about the given things. Many times we think that ignorance is an excuse for our escape from humiliation or punishment. The readings of today mention that ignorance cannot be an excuse for our lives. We are to overcome ignorance and find the truth of life.

The first reading highlights the stupidity of humanity or ignorance of humanity. The reading says that stupidity or ignorance lies in the inability to know and recognize true God. The author of the Book of Wisdom figuratively depicts the ignorance of people in being lost by the beauty, grandeur and power of creation. This mistakenly has mislead people to believe the created things to be gods. Incidentally, the reading strikes out the belief of pantheism as ignorance of humanity. The reading apologetically proposes that there is the One who has put them in order, who has designed the creation meticulously and adorned everything with beauty. The created reality bears witness to the author who created them. Consequently the effort of man to search God through deduction from the creation is commendable but failure to reach the author (God) of the created things is seen as stupidity which cannot be excused because man is given capability to decipher the creator through the creation.

The gospel passage continues with the theme of the coming of the Son of Man. The passage underlines two important underpinnings of the coming of the Son of Man; firstly, the coming of the Son of Man is unexpected or inescapable which would come about during the usual days of our ordinary living; secondly, the coming of the Son of Man would be noticed by people for some will be taken away from the earth (another example of the noticable character of the coming of the Son of Man is implied by the reference to the vultures which gather around the corpse, a noticable thing).

'Taking away of people' evokes the separation of the people from the other group as in the gospel of Matthew at the last judgement. This has eschatological overtones. The separation implies judgement by the Son of Man over those who believed in him and those who remained unbelievers or culpably ignorant of faith.

Dear friends, the readings of today are evident that ignorance is not an excuse. The first reading emphatically puts it that human beings are endowed with intelligence and are capable of knowing and discovering the truth, particularly the truth of God. In this regard, there is no way human beings can be excused of their mistaken faith. This means, Wisdom intends that every human person has to overcome the stupidity or ignorance of their life to reach the true knowledge of God.

The gospel also emphatically stresses that unbelief or ignorance is not an excuse for the preparation for the coming of the Son of Man. The coming of the Son of Man is unprecedented but sure, on our part, we have to be ever ready.

May God enlighten our minds to know the truth and live by it till the end of our lives.