WORD 2day: Thursday, 25th week in Ordinary time
September 24, 2020: Ecclesiasticus 1:2-11; Luke 9: 7-9
Continuing in the same line, the Gospel presents to us a personification of vanities, Herod! Herod had every opportunity to realise the vanity with which he was living, but he made no use of those. He even put an end to them. That would surely affect him all his life. That is why the Gospel says, "he kept saying, I beheaded John." How many such personifications we find in today's context - you turn your television sets on...there is a parade of these personifications of vanity, from all around the globe! The present COVID crisis has done its best in putting in a pin through our bloated balloons of vanity...but no lessons seem to have been learnt by humanity at large.
Now, stop! Before judging them all in such terms, let us have a good look at ourselves and our immediate surrounding! In our families where relationship should govern but selfishness takes over... between spouses, between parents and children, between siblings! In work places where formalities reign supreme and vanities and self glories are idolised! How genuine are we...and how sane and simple we strive to be?
Are there vanities which surround us today? Aren't there opportunities offered to realise them and to do away with them? From Vanity to Sanity...that is the primary journey we are challenged to make, so that we shall feel ready and prepared to embark upon the extraordinary journey towards sanctity! That is our itinerary: from vanity to sanctity, through sanity!