3 June, Saturday — Wisdom

Jun 3 – Memorial for St. Charles Lwanga & companions, martyrs

One of 22 Ugandan martyrs, St. Charles Lwanga is the patron of youth and Catholic action in most of tropical Africa. He protected his fellow pages aged 13 to 30 from the homosexual demands of the Bagandan ruler, Mwanga, and encouraged and instructed them in the Catholic faith during their imprisonment for refusing the ruler’s demands.

For his own unwillingness to submit to the immoral acts and his efforts to safeguard the faith of his friends, Charles was burned to death at in 1886, by Mwanga’s order. When Pope Paul VI canonized these 22 martyrs in 1964, he referred to the Anglican pages martyred for the same reason.

– http://www.americancatholic.org/Features/SaintOfDay/default.asp?id=1403

Ecc 51:17-27
Mk 11:27-33

“Glory be to him who has given me wisdom!”

Wisdom. Everyone wants to be considered as wise. What is wisdom? If you ask the world, they will tell you that wisdom is good judgment, common sense (so to speak), with knowledge and experience also counting. That all sounds just about right, but let’s think about it a little deeper. What is good judgment or common sense? What are we measuring against? If we look around, the yardstick that society provides for common sense is a little skewed and lacking in some areas. Worldly experience and knowledge have narrowed our minds and closed them to the truths. If you don’t believe me, just look at any social media channel and its algorithms; it learns your interest and only shows you what it thinks you like. So that after a while, your world vision is closing in on itself, to the exclusion of any other alternative, or opposing views.

If you could sum up wisdom according to the world, it is our attempts to explain the sensual world. Humans invented it for themselves against the true wisdom of God. Well, we know how that goes — we make a mess of things. 

What is wisdom according to the Catholic Faith? “It is a contemplation of God, a desire to understand, even in a limited way, the essence of truths. And through understanding, we gain a certitude about our beliefs that moves beyond faith”. In simple terms, it is seeing things the way God sees them, the divine truths.

The wisdom that comes with God’s truths is the kind of wisdom that grants us true joy, true happiness and true peace. The worldly version of wisdom, at best, allows us to pat ourselves on the back for a little bit until we face our foolishness once again.

Isn’t it presumptuous of us to think that we are wise beyond belief? How can we say that with a straight face in the light of God, the Creator, the Truth, the Way and the Life? Thinking about this deeply, I think we are misguided; some even have illusions of grandeur, to think that we are wise. Brothers and sisters, in comparison to God’s wisdom, we are truly insignificant. Even as insignificant as we are, God loved us that He gave us His only Son. Can our wisdom understand or grasp the true meaning of this act of love?

(Today’s OXYGEN by Winnie Kung)

Prayer: Our Heavenly Father, please grant us the gift of true wisdom. The wisdom to discern the divine truths versus the lies of the world that mislead us. Keep us in Your light.

Thanksgiving: Dearest Lord, thank you for Your mercy, even though we are unwise in our ways. Thank you for not giving up on us and loving us despite all our foolishness.