Homily for 28 Aug 2015

28 Aug 2015

She hardly ever gave him attention anymore.  I mean, it wasn’t that he she didn’t like him; she did.  And they’d known each other since they were little kids; they grew up together . . . they were hardly strangers.  But their whole relationship just fell apart.  Maybe she’d just gotten too comfortable with him and didn’t think she needed to spend as much time with him anymore.  I don’t know.

Well, whatever the reason, the love story didn’t turn out.  And she cried and cried.  She did love him but, as these things go, she didn’t realize it until it was too late.  He’d sent her a letter a month ago, but there it sat on the table, unopened.  “She’d get around to it, later,” she had said to herself.  “Later.”  Always “later.”  It wasn’t that she didn’t love him; she did.  But she’d get around to him later.

And then, one day, he’d come and gone . . . just like he said he would in that letter she opened—after the fact.  She was vigilant about everything in life, except for what really mattered.  She’d fallen asleep a long time ago in her relationship with him, and she’d let her oil lamp burn out without even knowing it.

She was one of the foolish virgins.  And here we are, the Church, the Bride of Christ—always tempted to fall asleep in our relationship with him and to let our lamp of faith and love burn out.  There’s always the temptation to take Jesus for granted and to just think, “Oh, he’ll always be there for us.  I can spend time with him later.”

And that’s true.  Jesus is always there for us; and we can always go to him later.  But why not go to him . . . now?  He gives us a divine package waiting to be opened up; he gives us his Body and Blood, he gives us Scripture and Tradition, he gives us the world.  It’s all there for us, ready to be taken and enjoyed.  Why would we just let that package just sit there, unopened?

Well, we’ll get around to it later.  Really, we will.  “Jesus is always there; we’ll get to him later.”