VANITY OF CREATED GOODS WITHOUT GOD

THURSDAY, TWENTY FIFTH WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME

Eccl 1:2-11; Ps 90:3-6,12-14,17; Lk 9:7-9

Wisdom reveals the Vanity of created Things

We have praised the man who lives with the right reason as one living with heavenly wisdom. Wisdom is the virtue that helps us to order things to their proper end. Hence, the man who understands the end of created things and their limited and proportionate goods has the light of heavenly wisdom. Everything God created has a proper end, which we have called their adequate good and defines their use. The finitude of the good and usage of every created nature took a poignant manifestation after the original fall of man, which introduced death and corruption into our experience and creation. God permitted death as the consequence of the rejection of his word to allow man to understand the result of his disobedience to the divine will, which is our eternal life. Thus, disobedience to divine will, enshrined in his word, is the cause of human toil and vanity in creation. This distressing experience of decline and death in creation is what the Preacher or Qohelet decries. “Vanity of vanities, the Preacher says. Vanity of vanities. All is vanity! For all his toil, his toil under the sun, what does man gain by it? A generation goes, a generation comes, yet the earth stands firm forever. The sun rises, the sun sets; then to its place it speeds and there it rises.”

This frustration and vanity of things is the conclusion from the wisdom of the Preacher. Natural wisdom brings us to this knowledge, given the fallen state of man. The evidence of vanity demonstrates a missing piece or link in the puzzle that visible creation became after the fall. That missing link that is supposed to complete the truth of creation, and fulfil its aspiration is the end of man as the apogee of creation. The material creation was made for man as its end, but man’s end was immaterial, for he was made for God. We were made for God and our souls are restless until we rest in God. But we derail from the path leading to God when we disobey the word of God. The consequence of our disobedience to the will of God is the misery and torture we experience as we go through the circles and repetition of events of life. It is a sign or manifestation of wisdom to discover these vanities in human life and experience. Fools suffer the vanities without knowing the cause of their jaded experience or boredom. They run after material goods without getting the satisfaction they desire from them. That is the experience of vanity. So, the finitude of created goods becomes a prison for them in life and death. “All things are wearisome. No man can say that eyes have not had enough of seeing, ears their fill of hearing. What was will be again, and there is nothing new under the sun.” We would be doomed to endless and recursive desires of finite goods if the word of God had not shed its light upon us.

God’s infinite mercy decreed physical death for man to free him from the torture of these vanities. “You turn men back to dust and say: ‘Go back, sons of men.’ To your eyes a thousand years are like yesterday, come and gone, no more than a watch in the night.” If man were to live in this tortuous circle of life without the communion of God that he rejected by disobedience to the word of God, his life would be hell on earth. Wisdom helps us to know that death is a blessing from God, that aids us to order our days to our proper end. “Make us know the shortness of our life that we may gain wisdom of heart. Lord, relent! Is your anger forever? Show pity to your servants.” Indeed, God showed pity to man from the moment of his fall, by allowing death and decreeing salvation for us. God did not abandon us without hope but gave us the support and light of his word for our salvation. The Eternal Word took our human nature in due time to rescue us from the prison that material life has become and order us again to our true end. The wise discover the fullness of salvation in Jesus Christ our Lord, while fools keep wondering who Jesus Christ is, like Herod the Tetrarch in today's gospel. He was puzzled by what he heard Jesus was doing and desired to see him. “So who is this I hear such reports about? And he was anxious to see Jesus.” We must not be like Herod, whose desire is to see Jesus as we see created goods and be entertained by the sight. We must inflame our desire to see Jesus Christ our Lord, for he is our everlasting life, joy, and peace.

Let us pray: Grant us, Lord, the grace to understand how precious the short time we have on earth is, so that guided by your word, we may possess wisdom in our hearts, and be filled with your love through the indwelling of your Holy Spirit, who guides us into the mystery of Jesus Christ our eternal life.