SEPTEMBER 7-8, 2019
5:00 PM (SAT), 7:30 AM, 10:30 AM (SUN) ORDINARY FORM MASSES
The Roman goddess Minerva was claimed to have burst from the head of Jupiter – after he had eaten her mother (who had been tricked into turning herself into a fly.) Minerva sprung from Jupiter’s head fully armed and wearing armor. For the Romans, she is the goddess of strategy and warfare, arts and trade, and – perhaps most notably – wisdom.
Like her Greek counterpart, Athena, she is associated with owls. Owls being considered a symbol of knowledge and wisdom, most likely because of their characteristic ability to see in the dark.
Throughout Greek and Roman art and architecture, one sees owls and owlets.
Built upon the ruins of the temple of Minerva in Rome is the 13th century Gothic church of Santa Maria sopre Minerva – whose name even betrays that it is built over the ruins of the original temple of Minerva.
St. Catherine of Siena died in the convent here at the end of the 14th century, the renaissance painter Fra Angelico died in the friary during the 15th century and both are buried here, as are the earthly remains of Popes Urban VII and Paul IV.
For about a dozen years at the beginning of the 15th century, the relics of St. Thomas Aquinas were kept in a chapel, until their translation to Naples.
Coincidentally, both St. Thomas Aquinas and St. Catherine of Siena have been named Doctors of the Church – not having anything to do with medicine, though. Rather a Doctor of the Church is someone who has made a significant contribution to theology and doctrine through their writings, study, or research.
Today is the Twenty-third Sunday in Ordinary Time.
Our readings can be loosely connected to “wisdom.” From a Theological perspective, wisdom is the “intellectual virtue concerning the first or highest causes of all things” – that “first cause” being God Almighty. Wisdom is one of the Seven Gifts of the Holy Spirit which illuminates the mind and draws it to God. Knowledge, also one of the Gifts of the Holy Spirit, allows a person to see things from God’s perspective.
The first Reading from the Book of Wisdom speaks of the necessity of “wisdom … sent [from the H]oly [Spirit]” in order for our human mind to grasp and know the wisdom of God.
Our Lord, in St. Luke’s Gospel, speaks of the requirements of being His disciple. He calls His disciples to extreme love. In using the word “hate” Jesus is not calling us to a positive antagonism, but rather to love Him so much, “that all other love is like hatred in comparison.”
We are admonished to “carry [our] own cross[es] and come after [Christ]” … We are to “calculate the cost” so that we might “finish the work” … To “renounce all” things in order to be true disciples.
For ourselves, this means a “daily identification with Christ … surrender to God’s will … [and] death to self.” This is serious business – as we heard in the opening prayer, for we are redeemed into freedom in Christ, and adopted by God the Father for a heavenly inheritance.
As a final foot-note, on your way out of the building today, in the narthex – that is the main entryway of the Church – look along the baseboard. Spaced regularly around the foyer are little owls on the tiles. As a sign and symbol to remind us that true wisdom and true knowledge can only be found in serving God and knowing Christ Jesus as Lord and Savior.
And as we approach this altar to receive the Sacred Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity of Jesus Christ, let us pray that we might constantly grow in our own knowledge of God and Jesus “Christ [Who is] the power of God and the wisdom of God.”
