TEXT: The Gospel According to Saint Matthew 25: 1-13

Our Lord Jesus had just completed within the sermon of the Olivet Discourse describing a picture of the catastrophic things to come at the end of the age and for the city of Jerusalem.  Some of his hearers would actually be caught up in the terrible events that would shortly follow in the years surrounding 70 A.D. when the forces of Rome under Titus would put down a rebellion of the Jewish nationalism of that era and begin the long dispersion of the Jewish people throughout the world.

It must be even for all the world that cataclysmic events must come.  The world will turn and turn, but, our God is victorious and will set all thing right when the Sun of Righteousness with healing in his wings descends and returns in Glory.

Jesus draws from these revelations about the future the practical moral reality that a Christian needs to be on watch, living each day as if it were his last.  It is not that we should be speculating about when these events will happen and what form they will take, but it is for us as Catholics / Christians to live in such a way that they find us in a state of grace.

My beloved -- Hell is real.  Judgment is real.  God will return to judge the living and the dead.  There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth, the pains of Hell, a Hell that we choose for ourselves in our rejection of the graces of God.

We must be on watch and ready for the second coming of Jesus.

This parable provides for us the vocation to be waiting for Christ’s return, because he is our Beloved One.  Like the Blessed Virgin Mary, who perfectly awaits the Day of the Lord and serves humbly until his return, let us also do so, like these virgins.

1  "Then the kingdom of heaven shall be compared to ten maidens who took their lamps and went to meet the bridegroom.
2  Five of them were foolish, and five were wise.

Occasionally, I like to compare these ten (10) virgins to ten (10) decades of the Most Holy Rosary of the Blessed Virgin Mary.  Five (5) of them are wise, and, there are five (5) that are foolish.  That is five of the ten "Hail Mary’s" are prayed with true dedication and devotion, and, five are not prayed with any devotion at all.  Just a thought, beloved in Christ.

We do not realize how serious these events are for us.  These events are in the futures of every person who professes to know God.  Are we wise, or, are we foolish.  Is there true devotion to Jesus in Mary?  Or, is there a false devotion to Jesus in Mary?

Do we do things out of habit, just fulfilling some obligation as though it means nothing?  Or, do we earnestly desire the Holy face of God, union with God through Jesus Christ, and a koinonia (Greek for "fellowship, communion") with the Lord through the devotion of the Blessed Virgin?

This allusion to the virgins brings forth this sense for this passage my friends.  We are all called (have a vocation) to0 holiness through the sanctifying graces of God.  Do we cooperate with grace and partake of the heavenly calling of God?

Thus, we have the wise and the foolish virgins.  Of what kind will you and I be?  Let us be wise, and seek the Divine Wisdom as St. Louis de Montfort calls us to in these latter times.

3 For when the foolish took their lamps, they took no oil with them;
4 but the wise took flasks of oil with their lamps.

There is an old song that sings, "Give me oil in my lamp keep it burning.  Give me oil in my lamp I pray.  Give me oil in my lamp, keep it burning, burning, burning.  Keep it burning till the break of s\day.  Sing Hallelujah, etc."

My friends, God has the oil of the Holy Spirit.  Have we filled out lamps with this oil of God, this anointing of holiness that our lamps might burn in a dark world to give light as we await his coming again for us?

The Wisdom of God is not worldly.  The Wisdom of God seeks "God alone."  May we, like Mary, have lamps full of oil that our lights might shine before God and men for the greater glory of God alone.

We are here at this point that follows.

5 As the bridegroom was delayed, they all slumbered and slept.

Have we not all slumbered and slept, as did the disciples in the Garden of Gethsemene," as our Lord sweat great drops of his Most Precious Blood on our behalf?  I believe so too.  None of us have waited for his return fully awake, as we witness the state of affairs for the Church in these latter times.  Perhaps, many have, but, most have not.

Moreover, the cry will come someday for the sleeper to awake

6 But at midnight there was a cry, 'Behold, the bridegroom! Come out to meet him.'
7 Then all those maidens rose and trimmed their lamps.

The parable is clear.  This call is coming.  It comes to us even now as we read it, 'Behold, the bridegroom! Come out to meet him.'  This call is to all who are suppose to be ready.
The virgins arise and trimmed their lamps.  There is nothing wrong with their lamps, but, some, because they did not fill up on the oils available to them through the Holy Spirit did not have enough oil, and their lamps had gone out!  They stumbled in the darkness, they fell, perhaps.  Now, they cried out for oil from the others, the wise, those who had sought the Divine Wisdom.  Yet, there was only enough for those who were wise.

8 And the foolish said to the wise, 'Give us some of your oil, for our lamps are going out.'
9 But the wise replied, 'Perhaps there will not be enough for us and for you; go rather to the dealers and buy for yourselves.'

Yes, each of us have choices to make.

Will our choice be to be foolish and forgetful of God alone?  Will our devotion be shallow and thus we will seek only a little oil to get by for a while, but not for the whole journey?  Or, will we be wise like those with the Divine Wisdom, and have enough oil for the journey Home to the Bridegroom?  Will we be to be presented to Christ with the oil of the Holy Spirit full in our lamps like the chaste Virgin?  (II Corinthians 11:1-6)

Five of them, foolish one, saw the light too late and went out to seek when there was no more oil available.

10  And while they went to buy, the bridegroom came, and those who were ready went in with him to the marriage feast; and the door was shut.

The door was shut.

The Ark of Noah’s door was shut long ago and many perished outside

There is another Ark of the Covenant that we may come to and the Mercy Seat is there and we are called to enter there and bring our petitions to God alone and obtain Mercy now.

Shall we not fill up there at the Mercy Seat and find the oil that we need there for all eternity as we travel the road of holiness?

We are called unto holiness. Beloved of God.  We are called (a vocation) to become who we really are called to be in Christ, in the Beloved One we love and desire.  Let us desire him like Mary desires to show us her Son.

May this never be our status as we read these final words.

11  Afterward the other maidens came also, saying, 'Lord, lord, open to us.'
12 But he replied, 'Truly, I say to you, I do not know you.'
13  Watch therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour.

We are called, therefore, to watch for Jesus with lamps filled with oil, filled with the Holy Spirit, we might be known of Jesus and know God alone in the fulness of salvation.



Deus et Sanctissima.