Friday of the Thirty-second Week in Ordinary Time

Lectionary: 495

As it was in the days of Noah,
so it will be in the days of the Son of Man;
they were eating and drinking,
marrying and giving in marriage up to the day
that Noah entered the ark,
and the flood came and destroyed them all.


For many generations Americans have lived in the hope that the next generation will have it better than the last. Parents sacrificed for their children as they built elementary and secondary schools, colleges and universities. They wanted their children to be prepared for the challenges of an unpredictable future. And they found encouragement in God's promises. 
But they also saw and read the threats of judgment and doom. For every promise there is a threat; they seem to be as real as each other.
Life, of course, is full of threats and their fulfillment. Common sense warns us not to play with fire, medicine and money; and yet people do. Cartalk offers a list of Famous Last Words like, "Hold my beer, Now watch this!" An Internet site awards a "Darwin Award" to people who failed to think things through. 
If life is so cruel we should not be surprised to find serious warnings in the Bible. The choice is never "Listen to the Word of God" or "Have a nice day!" It's rather like the warnings in today's passage from the sunniest of the four gospels, 

Similarly, as it was in the days of Lot:they were eating, drinking, buying,selling, planting, building;on the day when Lot left Sodom,fire and brimstone rained from the sky to destroy them all.So it will be on the day the Son of Man is revealed.

During November, as the liturgical year comes to an end, the Church ponders "death and judgment, heaven and hell." There are many self-described Christians who insist that God is too nice to fulfill his threats. Should we only tell them to "Have a nice day?"  
The Prophet Ezekiel answers that with a warning for believers:

You, son of man—I have appointed you as a sentinel for the house of Israel; when you hear a word from my mouth, you must warn them for me. When I say to the wicked, “You wicked, you must die,” and you do not speak up to warn the wicked about their ways, they shall die in their sins, but I will hold you responsible for their blood. If, however, you warn the wicked to turn from their ways, but they do not, then they shall die in their sins, but you shall save your life. Ezekiel 33