I AM PART OF ALL 

THAT  I  HAVE  MET

INTRODUCTION

The title of my homily for this 20th Friday in Ordinary Time is, “I Am Part Of All That I Have Met.”

It’s a line from the 1842 poem by Alfred Lord Tennyson, entitled, “Ulysses” - the great Greek character of many travels and adventures.

For some reason that line of that poem has become part of what I have met. I don’t know if an English teacher paused and underlined that line - or if I heard some preacher preach or speak about it. Whatever, it stuck we me.

And I have always intrigued and interested in autobiographies, biographies, memoirs, and questions of origins. At a preaching workshop the speaker once asked, “Why do you preach the way you preach? Who influenced you.”

I loved the comment the Greek poet and diplomat, George Seferis, made when talking this theme: “Don’t ask who’s influenced me. A lion is made up of the lambs he’s digested, and I’ve been reading all my life.”

Yet I believe it is good to know where we come from, where we have lived, what teachers influenced us, where we are in your family birth order, what our parents were like. I often ask couples who are to be married, “How do your parents argue?” There is usually a pause when I ask that question. Then when both start to answer that question, sometimes a light goes on.

As Socrates said, “The unexamined life is not worth living.”

TODAY’S GOSPEL

How many people were influenced that day when a Pharisee, a scholar of the law, as we heard in today’s gospel, asked Jesus, “Which commandment in the law is the greatest?”

And Jesus answered, “You shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the greatest and the first commandment. The second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. The whole law and the prophets depend on these two commandments.”

Was that scholar moved by Jesus’ answer? Was anyone in the crowd influenced? The moment was remembered and made it’s way into our gospels. How many people have read or heard that message ever since and changed their lives or focused or refocused their lives to practice these 2 simple commandment.

FIRST READING

Did one of the names in today’s first reading from the opening chapter of the book of Ruth ring a bell?

A little girl was born in Kosciusko, Mississippi on January 29, 1954. Her parents weren’t married. On her birth certificate they put her name as Orpah Winfrey - Orpah being the sister-in-law of Ruth. Both are mentioned in today’s first reading.

Orpah - became Oprah - a simple reversal of the letters “r’ and “h” - because those who knew the little girl found it easier to pronounce. As a result the planet had a new born baby named, “Oprah”.

On her show and in her writings Oprah Winfrey has told from time to time the influences on her life: her grandmother - church - poverty - going from her grandmother’s farm to her mother in Milwaukee - big time poverty - sexual abuse - going to her father in Nashville - and his insistence of reading, studying, discipline - being given opportunities to speak in public - church and school, winning beauty contests, being given a chance at 17 to read lines on a local TV station, a college degree, mistakes, drugs, sex, etc. Baltimore, Chicago, listening to suggestions, hard work, etc. etc. etc.

In today’s first reading we hear about Ruth and Orpah. At the death of a man named Elimelech, Naomi, his wife, was left with two sons who married Moabite women, one named Orpah and the other named Ruth. After 10 years both sons died and Naomi was now left with two daughters-in-law. Orpah went back to Moab. Naomi said to Ruth, “Go back like Orpah to your people and your god.” Ruth stayed with Naomi saying, “Do not ask me to abandon or forsake you! For wherever you go, I will go, wherever you lodge I will lodge, your people shall be my people, and your God my God.”

CONCLUSION

The title of my homily is, “I Am Part Of All That I Have Met.”

Ruth re-settles with Naomi and is spotted by Boaz. They marry and their son Obed becomes the grandfather of David. Ruth becomes one part of the long line of people that Jesus has in his geneology - (Matthew 1:5) as well as the first name of many women ever since.

Orpah becomes the birth certificate name of a billionaire woman in the 20 and 21st centuries.

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Statue on top: Ruth and Naomi - by Leonard Baskin - outdoor sculpture in Wichita, Kansas, 1978