Reading of the Word of God

Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia

You are a chosen race,
a royal priesthood, a holy nation,
a people acquired by God
to proclaim his marvellous works.

Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia

Sirach 4,11-19

Wisdom brings up her own children and cares for those who seek her. Whoever loves her loves life, those who seek her early will be filled with joy. Whoever possesses her will inherit honour, and wherever he walks the Lord will bless him. Those who serve her minister to the Holy One, and the Lord loves those who love her. Whoever obeys her rules the nations, whoever pays attention to her dwells secure. If he trusts himself to her he will inherit her, and his descendants will remain in possession of her; for though she takes him at first through winding ways, bringing fear and faintness on him, trying him out with her discipline till she can trust him, and testing him with her ordeals, she then comes back to him on the straight road, makes him happy and reveals her secrets to him. If he goes astray, however, she abandons him and leaves him to his own destruction.

Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia

You will be holy,
because I am holy, thus says the Lord.

Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia

We are faced with a description of the value of wisdom and of the fruits it provides for those who seek it faithfully. Wisdom and the Word of God go hand in hand in the book of Sirach. Looking for one means listening to the other. The author immediately indicates the secret of wisdom: "Whoever loves wisdom loves life." For this reason, it is necessary to look for it from the morning in order to live according to it and not according to oneself, which is the continuous temptation of each one that easily makes oneself teacher to oneself. To venerate wisdom, to listen to it, to trust in it, are the invitation that is given to us in order to live fully. Wisdom is necessary to understand the time we live in and also to know ourselves. The author knows that acquiring the wisdom that comes from God involves work. Its acquisition is not immediate. At the beginning wisdom leads "on tortuous paths" and that "torments with its discipline." It is a matter of accepting the effort of living according to wisdom, the word that comes from God, which does not always appear immediately clear, and which requires "discipline" and commitment which may also appear annoying. But then, once this effort is accepted, wisdom makes life joyful and helps to discern evil and be ashamed of sin. Instead, there is a "shame" which is the right awareness of oneself, of one's limit, and which therefore brings "glory and grace." Let us welcome the richness of this reflection so that each of us accept the effort of growing at the school of the Word of God.