Friday of
the 31st Week in Ordinary Time
November 6, 2015 8:30am and 11:00am Seniors
I think a short lesson about
Scripture is helpful this morning.
There is a difference between an
allegory and a parable.
Jesus’ story of the Sower and the
Seed is called a parable, but is really an allegory.
In an allegory, every detail
means something.
So, in that story of the Sower
and the Seed, every detail meant something – the sower, the seed, and each type
of soil on which the seed fell.
In a parable, there is only one
point and the other details don’t mean anything.
So, in today’s story about the
dishonest employee, Jesus’ one and only lesson is expressed in the last
sentence:
“For the children of this world are more prudent in dealing with their
own generation than the children of light.”
Jesus is not endorsing the
dishonesty of this employee.
That and other points in the
story are not his lesson.
The lesson is that he wants us to
be as industrious and as enterprising and as prudent about the things of God as
we and others are about other things.
So, use our time and
opportunities well.
Use them well for reading
Scripture and praying and growing closer to God.
And use them well for doing
things that build up God’s kingdom on this earth, like caring for the poor and
the sick or passing on our faith to children and youth.
Use our time and opportunities as
best we can – in a prudent, enterprising, industrious way.
That is the one lesson of this
parable.
