Preacher’s Sketchbook: Thirty-Second Sunday of the Year
November 1, 2011
Each week, a Dominican member of the Provincial Preaching Advisory board prepares this Preacher’s Sketchbook in anticipation of the upcoming Sunday Mass. The idea of the Preacher’s Sketchbook is to take quotations from the authority of the Church–the Pope, the Fathers of the Church, documents of the Councils, the saints–that can help spark ideas for the Sunday homily. Just as an artist’s sketchbook preserves ideas for later elaboration, so we hope the Preacher’s Sketchbook will provide some ideas for homiletical elaboration.
Sketchbook
Bl. Henry Suso, Wisdom’s Watch upon the Hours
It is indeed true that each of the Persons may be accepted as being himself Wisdom, and that all the Persons together are one, eternal Wisdom; yet since wisdom is attributed to the Son, and since, by reason of his being begotten, this is fitting to him, therefore it is customary for the Father’s beloved son to be understood by that appellation.
Bl. Henry Suso, Wisdom’s Watch upon the Hours
[Divine Wisdom says:] I am always ready to return my beloved’s love, I am there in choir, I am there in bed, at table, on the road, in the cloister, in the market place, so that there can be no place where the love which is God is not present and where I am not answering my beloved with love.
St. Thomas Aquinas, Commentary on Matthew
“The kingdom of heaven will be like ten virgins who took their lamps…” Lamps are vessels of light, from which we can understand them to be, following Hilary, souls illumined by the light of faith, which they received in baptism (Isa 58:8). Or the lamps signify works, according to Augustine: “For your works should be luminous.” Therefore to “take their lamps” is to prepare the soul, or to dispose it to good works.
St. Thomas Aquinas, Commentary on Matthew
Who is the bridegroom, and who the bride? This can be explained in two ways, according to two kinds of marriage. The first is the marriage of divinity to the flesh, which took place in the womb of the Virgin. The bridegroom is the Son Himself, and the bride human nature; so for the bride to go out to meet the bridegroom means nothing other than to serve Christ. There also is the marriage of Christ to the Church (Jn 3:29).
Benedict XVI, Deus Caritas Est
We have come to believe in God’s love: in these words the Christian can express the fundamental decision of his life. Being Christian is not the result of an ethical choice or a lofty idea, but the encounter with an event, a person, which gives life a new horizon and a decisive direction.
Benedict XVI, Deus Caritas Est
Indeed, God is visible in a number of ways. In the love-story recounted by the Bible, he comes towards us, he seeks to win our hearts, all the way to the Last Supper, to the piercing of his heart on the Cross, to his appearances after the Resurrection and to the great deeds by which, through the activity of the Apostles, he guided the nascent Church along its path. Nor has the Lord been absent from subsequent Church history: he encounters us ever anew, in the men and women who reflect his presence, in his word, in the sacraments, and especially in the Eucharist.
Other Resources
Readings for Thirty-Second Sunday of the Year (Year A)
Additional Preaching Resources
- Fr. Francis Martin Website
- Biblius Clerus, a resource of the Congregation for the Clergy
- The Catena Aurea of St. Thomas Aquinas, O.P., for the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John
