Word to the Wise
Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - Wednesday in the 34th Week in Ordinary Time
[Dan 5:1-6, 13-14, 16-17, 23-28 and Luke 21:12-19]When the king saw the wrist and hand that wrote, his face blanched his thoughts terrified him, his hip joints shook and his knees knocked....
When I was a lad so many years ago, the Saturday trip to the movie theater was a regular part of my life. Along with many other kids, I looked forward to the cartoon that would come on first, and when it was "Casper the Friendly Ghost," I knew that I would see some spectacular visual and sound effects from characters who reacted to poor Casper who was only trying to be friendly! I was reminded of this by the description of the king's reaction to the vision of the hand writing on the wall at the party! Indeed, this story has given us the expression: "to see the handwriting on the wall," meaning a dire warning about something bad about to happen! Sometimes we have to be forced to look at it!
In this case, Daniel confronts the king with his blasphemous behavior in using vessels taken from the temple in Jerusalem as party items! Very likely, this story is meant to describe the later behavior of the Greek-oriented ruler Antiochus Epiphanes, who reigned in Israel around the time of the Maccabees, and who introduced pagan idols into the temple!
This would all seem like so much ancient history and good story-telling if it weren't for the fact that our own culture is falling prey to the loss of the sacred in the face of rampant secularism, a religion of its own! Is there some handwriting on the wall that we are ignoring? AMEN