St. Aloysius Catholic Church in Baton Rouge, Louisiana shared a reflection on Nov. 8.

Rev. Randy Cuevas shared his thoughts on the passages of scripture from the 32nd Sunday in Ordinary Time. 

“Biblically speaking, wisdom is personified as a woman because the Jewish mystical tradition saw wisdom as the feminine aspect of God,” Rev. Cuevas wrote. “Wisdom greets us like the rising sun when we watch for her. She comes to those who are consciously seeking truth and goodness.”

In the second reading, we see that St. Paul is telling the church in Thessalonika that the return of our Lord is not in the near future. However, these people did not have any reason to fear that they would not live to see the second coming of Christ, as death is not an ending to life. 

“Jesus’ story about the bridesmaids is intended to encourage us to be prepared for the coming of the kingdom of God. The wise bridesmaids took precautions in case the groom came late. They prepared enough oil to last through the night. Therefore they were not left out in the cold when the wedding party arrived later than expected,” Rev. Cuevas wrote. 

We will always have questions about death, but even though we are told that this earthly life will end, we have hope in the Lord, who has put an end to the finality of death. 

As Christians, we understand that death is not a final end to life, but rather a periodic experience, where we rid ourselves of things that distance us from God and die with Christ. At the end of our lives, we are actually reunited with God through the end of our earthly lives. 

“As we receive more and more of God’s presence in our lives, the more we relinquish those things that are deadly in our daily living,” Rev. Cuevas wrote.