Thursday, September 22, 2022

 Thursday of the Twenty-fifth Week in Ordinary Time

(Ecclesiastes 1: 2-11; Luke 9:7-9)

How could youth accept the first reading as relevant?  They see inventions all the time.  Twenty years ago Facebook was cool.  Youth used it to communicate without parental awareness.  Now Facebook is mostly used by older generations to keep track of their families.  Youth use Instagram or, perhaps Tic-Toc. 

But the author, named Qoheleth which simply means preacher, is not thinking of physical innovations.  He has attitudes and postures in mind.  People whenever and wherever want to be lovely, rich, and famous.  They like to consider themselves as better than average.  Surely these pretensions are vane. Some say, “There is no God” while others reject Scripture’s presentation of God for their imaginings.  These postures may also be considered vanity.

Ecclesiastes, the musings of the preacher, shake readers up to reality.  It forces them to see their tendencies to err and sin.  But it does not despair about finding meaning in life.  Its conclusions will hardly contain the full range of life’s possibility.  These will be seen only when Jesus Christ appears on the world stage.  But Qoheleth prepares the world for him.

No comments: