This weekend we are honoring those who have died in the past 12 months, especially those connected to our parish. We will light a candle for each one. It's a simple ritual. Rituals are essential as we remember those we love who have died.
As we begin High School footballs playoffs this weekend, a ritual that is significant occurs on the North Minneapolis football team. That team made it to the state playoffs this year. In February of 2022, their star quarterback, Deshaun Hill, was shot and killed near the school. The team wanted to ritualize his passing, so in each game since then on their first possession on offense, the team takes a knee and remains silent for a bit. Of course a penalty is called for delay of game but the opposing side is aware of this and they decline the penalty. Then the game continues as usual.
A simple yet powerful ritual. I encourage all of you who have lost someone this past year to do some kind of ritual to honor your loved one . . . for example, make their favorite meal on their birthday; light a candle for them (not only here at church) but on the table when you gather for Thanksgiving; buy something they would like at Christmas and donate it to someone else. Do you get the idea?
And never be ashamed to keep talking to them, for their presence with you has changed but it doesn’t end. The way you love them doesn’t end, it just changes. So continue to love them well.
They are still significant.
Which brings us to the gospel story today. The parable of the 10 virgins (or bridesmaids) can nudge us to look at the significance of our own lives. At the time of Jesus, weddings were a many-day event and one portion of the rituals would be for the bridegroom to have this big procession go get his intended wife at her parents’ home and then to bring her back to his home where they could be intimate and then they all go to a big banquet to celebrate. So the bridesmaids would be waiting, but the 5 not prepared would leave the doings to refill their oil lamps and if the bridegroom came back with his bride during the time, they wouldn’t be part of the festivities. They missed it.
The parable illustrates the precariousness of valuing the time we each have been given to live lives that matter. Not to be like the foolish bridesmaids who squander their time before the bridegroom comes (the bridegroom is to represent Jesus, not so much at the end of time but in the here and now of wanting to be close to us).
Well in all my years of being present to someone who is dying, the hardest ones to comfort were not those in pain (for they looked for relief) but those who felt as if they had not done anything significant with their lives . . . and if they had a few more years they could get it right.
It reminds of a book written a few years ago an Australian nurse, named Bonnie Ware. She works with people who are dying. She asked them if they had any regrets or would they do anything differently. She found a pattern and put them together. The book is called THE TOP FIVE REGRETS OF THE DYING. Here is what she found . . .
#5 I wish that I had let myself be happier.
#4 I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends.
#3 I wish I’d had the courage to express my feelings.
#2 I wish I hadn’t worked so hard.
#1 I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.
We honor the lives of the deceased today and it’s sad. But what might be sadder is if we don’t learn from their regrets and start living our lives to the fullest . . . starting today. To be like the wise bridesmaids ready and willing to greet Jesus and enter the feast.
I wish that I had let myself be happier.
I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends.
I wish I’d had the courage to express my feelings.
I wish I hadn’t worked so hard.
I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.