9/4/2014 – Thursday of 22nd week in Ordinary Time – 1 Corinthians 3:18-23, Psalm 24:1-6

      I found an interesting contrast in two of the readings we have in our daily mass today.  Our first reading from Paul’s first letter to the Church at Corinth states that “the wisdom of this world is foolishness in the eyes of God.”  But, in contrast, the psalmist declares: “To the Lord belongs the earth and all that fills it.”  I remember that I was with Father Albeen registering him for surgery at the hospital.   The lady taking down his information asked him if he was married, and I responded: “No, he is a Catholic priest.”  She went on with the other questions, and then she said she wanted to verified something that we had said earlier.  She asked why we mentioned that Father Albeen was a Catholic priest when we stated that he was not married.  She just couldn’t believe that priests cannot marry.  She had never heard that before.  She asked: You can  never marry?  Never?  Never ever ever ever?  I said, yes, never ever ever ever.  Her response was:  Well ok.  That’s pretty strange.  But I guess it is what it is. Sometimes our faith calls us to do something that the world doesn’t understand.  Sometime what we do for our faith might seem foolish to the wisdom of the world.  But, sometimes, that is what we are called to do. May we take joy in our faith, even in the ways we are mocked or treated as being foolish according to the ways of the world.