Seventeenth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year A
July 27, 2014
Church of Saint Ignatius Loyola, Chestnut Hill MA
Joseph M. O’Keefe, S.J.
Some of you probably remember the sitcom Frasier. In one episode, Frasier
and Niles had a minor car accident and ended up in the hospital. Thinking that his
injuries were minor, Frasier left the hospital early. Someone else took his place in
the line and suffered a fatal heart attack. Names got confused and the next morning
Frasier opened the newspaper to read his own obituary. He wasn’t happy with what
he read.
Imagine waking up tomorrow morning and opening up the Globe or, for some
of you but probably not many in this congregation, the Herald. You are browsing
through the paper and you flip through to the Irish sports pages, aka the death
notices. And there is your obituary. Would you be happy with what you read?
Centuries before Frasier, St. Ignatius had somewhat the same idea in the first
week of the Spiritual Exercises. He asks retreatants to meditate on the scene of their
deathbed and to ask themselves what really matters to them in that circumstance.
Then, taking the fruits of that reflection, he asks the person to project backwards
from the deathbed to the present moment. Looking at one’s life from the vantage
point of death is an invitation to wisdom. How can the wisdom that comes to me in
my final moments shape my priorities in this moment? How can the wisdom that
comes to me in my final moments shape my priorities in all of the moments of my
life?
In our first reading from 1st Kings we hear God’s response to the prayer of
young Solomon for wisdom, for an understanding heart.
“Because you have asked for this—
not for a long life for yourself,
nor for riches,
nor for the life of your enemies,
but for understanding so that you may know what is right—
I do as you requested.
I give you a heart so wise and understanding that there has never been
anyone like you up to now.”
And there is a challenging lesson to be learned from the story of Solomon. He was
wise beyond his younger years, but in his older years he succumbed to the lure of
power and wealth and sowed the seeds of the destruction of a united Israel. It is one
thing to receive the gift of wisdom; it is another to remain wise over the long haul
amid the temptations of the world. We need to be attentive to our moral compass,
to know and follow our north star, to stay on the right path.
Back in the 1970s, after all the challenges to tradition in the 1960s, there was
a fad in schools called “Values Clarification.” The practice was helpful in some ways,
but fell out of favor because its foundation was relativistic – with no clarity about
right and wrong. Though I disagree with the practice for that reason, I like the term.
2
I think that today’s readings call you and me to an exercise in values
clarification, a reflection on what is most important in our lives. As we continue to
read Matthew’s gospel in Ordinary Time, we hear two more of Jesus’s metaphors for
the kingdom of God: the hidden treasure, and the pearl of great price. These
parables raise the questions: What is the treasure for which I would give it all up?
What is the pearl of great price for which I would sell everything I own?
Thinking about death is a good way of bringing life into perspective. It’s
Monday morning and, like Frasier Crane, you open up the paper to find your
obituary there. Would you be happy with what you read? What would you want
listed as your main accomplishments? Who are the people you are leaving behind
that mean the most to you? What do you wish you had done that you didn’t do?
What would you have done differently? What are the main questions that life asked
you and how did you respond? When all is said and done, what were the values and
priorities that shaped your life? And how would you describe these if you were to
write an “autobituary?”
During my nearly 60 years on earth, I’ve been to a lot of places and done a lot
of things. Like all of us, I think, I have at times become forgetful of God’s lavish gifts
and graces, the hidden treasures and the pearls of great price. But we are here in
church, pilgrims on the road together, enlightened by God’s word and nourished by
the eucharist, as we stop to take stock of our lives. Back to the obituary: I don’t
know about you, but in the midst of it all, I’d be satisfied to have my life summed up
in a simple one-line obituary in tomorrow’s paper: “He had a wise and
understanding heart.”