Thursday of the Twenty-Second Week in Ordinary Time
I’m a skeptic at heart, so when I read today’s Gospel reading I can’t help but put myself in Simon’s shoes (or sandals, or whatever). I imagine having tried for hours to catch fish unsuccessfully and then someone telling me to go out and try again. I’m sure I would roll my eyes and think of myself as wise enough not to give it another try. However, Simon doesn’t do that in today's gospel reading. Instead he seems to foolishly trust in Jesus’ command and casts his nets for another try which results in a bounty that he can hardly handle. In the end it seems that he would have even been more foolish not to admit the limits of his own wisdom had he chosen to not trust in Jesus’ command. Its this mentality that I believe Paul is calling us to embrace in the first reading from the First Letter to the Corinthians. That perhaps there is a connection between foolishness and wisdom rooted in our own flawed human nature.
Paul, in today's first readings, helps us see, like Simon, that when we feel we are wise beyond all foolishness we have lost sight of what true wisdom is. I’m sure that there are people who could make arguments that keeping an open ear and heart to what God might be calling us to is more foolish than taking our own life into our hands, but doing so teeters on the temptation of idolatry – to diminish the need for God and place ourselves in the position of God. Instead, as Christians, we are called to consistently and foolishly trust in a loving and merciful God even when that might seem as clear as mud.
This sense of foolishness doesn’t depict carelessness. Clearly there are decisions we could make that are foolish, that have no aspect of wisdom or intentionality taken into account. So perhaps that is where the two, foolishness and wisdom, are needed to create a sense of balance for us. Because our true wisdom must embrace a sense of foolishness in order to see past ourselves.
In what ways do you feel blessed with the gift of wisdom? What about how you live your life allows for this sense of foolishness that we see in today’s readings? Are there other things you are foolish about that don’t entertain any aspect of wisdom? How might you engage a sense of humility alongside the gift of wisdom and entertain this aspect of foolishness?
- Mike Bennett