WISDOM OR  FOLLY?

INTRODUCTION

The title of my homily is, “Wisdom or Folly”?

Being wise or being foolish?

TODAY’S GOSPEL 

Last night I was checking out William Barclay’s Commentary on Luke 14: 25-33. That’s today’s gospel. I often find his comments helpful - very readable - and grabbing.

In this gospel text  Jesus talks about someone building a tower and not being able to finish it. The result is people  laugh at the builder. That triggered for Barclay  mention of a tower in Scotland - where this actually happened.

He tells the story about a guy named M’Caig who built a structure in a place called Oban.  It became known as M’Caig’s Folly.

I never heard about it - so I looked it up on the  Google search engine. There, I found, some interesting comments and some good pictures of the “Tower”.

There above the city of Oban in Scotland is this gigantic round - about 3 stories high - structure that looks like the coliseum in Rome.

It has no roof and its walls are too weak to be anything but a big round wall of stones - with openings as if for windows. It may be as big as a baseball infield.

This rich guy, John M’Caig,  built it - with his own plans. It was his way of giving his workers - stone mason work in the winter. He finished the façade - the walls - in about 5 years - just in time for his death. It doesn’t look like a tower. Perhaps he was going to put a tower in the center. It’s called, “M’Caig’s Tower”  - but it became known as “M’Caig’s Folly”.  

It never served as anything but a big round wall with niches. Some think he was going to have statues of himself and his family placed in the open spaces.

It has a great view of the harbor that leads out to the Atlantic.

In time, it turned out to become a unique tourist attraction - for those who would find such a building interesting. It certainly is an unexpected sight.

I checked out what tourists wrote after experiencing the sight/site.

One tourist said if you have 10 minutes - go for it.

Someone else said that it’s worth seeing if you want to take a nice walk up a hill - see a great view -  and besides that they have a neat chocolate factory nearby.

A POSSIBLE MESSAGE FROM TODAY’S READINGS

Today’s readings raises the question: “How do I do life?”  

Both readings ask us to be smart and have a clear plan for building our life.

In today’s gospel Jesus is saying to plan ahead - and be careful of family - as well as what might get in the way.  If you want to follow me in the plan of your life or the plan for your life, put first things first. Carry your cross. Don’t let family or anything else get in the way.

If you’re going to build a tower, be smart and plan ahead. Nobody wants to be called foolish. Nobody wants to have a folly named after them.

Last night in thinking about this I also looked in my many quote books some quote about all  this.

Neat, I found the following words from Ralph Waldo Emerson that go like this:

“One man’s justice is another’s injustice;  one man’s beauty another’s ugliness; one man’s wisdom another’s folly.”

I assume that Jesus wants each of us  to be wise and to look ahead and plan ahead - and choose wisely with our individual talents - what we want to do with our lives.  

Today’s first reading says we don’t want to spend our lives with a blurred vision - to live with fear and trembling - and to spend our times grumbling or questioning.

CONCLUSION

So that’s my homily - entitled, “Wisdom or Follow.”

Our move.