Memorial of Saint Monica

 Lectionary: 428

The Kingdom of heaven will be like ten virgins who took their lamps and went out to meet the bridegroom. Five of them were foolish and five were wise. The foolish ones, when taking their lamps, brought no oil with them, but the wise brought flasks of oil with their lamps.

Our first reading from the earliest extent document of our Christian tradition -- 1 Thessalonians -- touches on the ever-popular topic of sexual morality. Saint Paul urged his new converts to

"refrain from immorality, that each of you know how to acquire a wife for himself

in holiness and honor, not in lustful passion as do the Gentiles who do not know God." 

He assumed, as people have from time immemorial, that our sexual urges are primarily procreative and oriented toward stable contracts between men and women where their children would flourish in a safe, predictable environment. Marriage in the ancient world was not about companionship or friendship; romantic ideals would not appear for another thousand years. 

The Apostle pressed on with his reflection, reminding them and us of the dangers of urban life, 

"not to take advantage of or exploit a brother or sister in this matter, for the Lord is an avenger in all these things, as we told you before and solemnly affirmed."

It is fun to watch this routine moral standard rise up in wrath and bring down powerful governors and popular entertainers. The media seem to think they've invented or just discovered sexual morality, as if we have not been saying the same thing since Adam married Eve. 

It makes you wonder if the world is finally coming to its senses. 

Nah!

The world will always produce its five wise and five foolish virgins. Some of the fools will be our own children who would not listen to common sense; and others will be pagans who decided as children they would not smoke, drink, and act stupid like their parents. Some will turn away from their foolishness to return to the Church; and others will realize their native common sense is welcome among us. 

Saint Paul concludes his admonition with:

For God did not call us to impurity but to holiness. Therefore, whoever disregards this,

disregards not a human being but God, who also gives his Holy Spirit to you.

Our natural law tradition teaches us that human cultures can decipher the moral code built into our human nature. Periodically it rises up to slap down the powerful and vindicate the lowly.