Homily for St. Teresa of Jesus - 2018
By Bishop Thomas Zinkula
Carmelite Monastery
St. Teresa helped reform the Carmelite religious order, and she also played a major role in reforming the institutional Church, which was in a really big mess at that time. Kind of like today! Prayer no doubt was the most important thing she did to aid these reformation projects. Likewise, prayer is the most important thing we can do in helping to reform our Church today.
The Book of Wisdom was written in the last half of the first century B.C. The author’s purpose was to strengthen the faith of his fellow Jews in Alexandria, Egypt. People were getting caught up in the wonder of science. There was a new cosmopolitan and individualistic mentality. There was skepticism. There was dissatisfaction with traditional ideas. It was a time of crisis for the faith, which some Jews had abandoned, replacing it with secular philosophies. There was concern that more Jews would follow in their footsteps. Sound familiar?!
What are we to do about the mess in our society and culture? The passage from Wisdom suggests that we should seek wisdom. We should prefer Wisdom over power, riches, health, beauty and light. That too is something we can pray for; that all of us will seek Wisdom in preference to power, privilege, honor and material things.
In the passage from Paul’s letter to the Romans, he tells them to remember that they are children of God, and he encourages them consequently to rely on God and to cry out to Abba, Father. When they say they don’t know how to pray adequately, he says to let the Spirit intercede with inexpressible groanings. We tend to groan, physically, about the problems we face in life. Paul says we also should groan, spiritually, about the messiness of our Church and our culture. That perhaps sometimes is the only way we are able to pray.
Finally, in John’s gospel we listened in on Jesus’ conversation with a Samaritan woman. It was scandalous that he would talk to a woman in public like that. It also was scandalous that he would ask her for a drink of water, because Samaritan women were regarded by Jews as ritually impure. Therefore, Jews were forbidden to drink from any vessel they had handled. Just as Jesus did then, so it is time for us now to think outside the box; to reconsider some of our structures, practices and procedures; to draw some lines in different places; to allow the laity, especially women, to have more leadership roles in the Church.
It is time for us to seek living water and to be open to the Wisdom and the guidance of the Spirit. Let’s pray for this too.
