A reading of the holy gospel according to Saint Matthew. As Jesus was walking along the Sea Of Galilee, he watched two brothers, Simon, now known as Peter, and his brother Andrew, casting their nets into the sea. They were fishermen. Jesus, of course, came from Nazareth. He's a he's a landsman.
He's far in those days, far inland, midway close to midway between the the Lake Of Galilee and the Mediterranean Sea, but definitely inland. And here, he is coming and talking to fishermen, men who spent their lives on the lake whose father's probably there and whose grandfathers were probably waterman also. And notice, the text says they were fishermen. Jesus said to them, come after me, and I will make you fishers of men. Now notice this.
The text says, immediately, they abandoned their nets and became his followers. They also abandoned their boats. Do you know what that means to a waterman? Jesus walked along a little farther along the lake and caught sight of two other brothers, James, Zebedee's son, and his brother, John. They too were in their boat, putting their nets into order with their father, Zebedee.
Jesus called them and noticed, and immediately, they abandoned their boat and their father to follow Jesus. And this is the gospel of the lord. In the name of the father and of the son and of the holy spirit, amen. I should say something about Saint Andrew and this marvelous text because it's extremely mysterious and extremely dramatic. But this is the last day of November, the month of what we used to call the poor souls.
I don't like that. It's too neoplatonic for me. But the point is hit during the month of November, the reality of it is that we try to bring into our active consciousness the present existence of the men and the women, young and old, with whom our lives have been associated in one way or another. Because if we believe in immortality, we're not talking about immortality of souls. We're talking about immortality of individual human beings with names.
As our holy father keeps on saying, irreplaceable individuals. That's what immortality Christian immortality means. My concluding thought for November November is is this, this, that we do not experience death. We do not experience death. All we experience is life.
Now, that may that's a self evident proposition, but it may not it may seem silly to you. Because but if you think a minute, you'll see how absolutely true it is. You can't experience anything without your body functioning. And therefore and death means your body isn't functioning. Ergo, you can't have any experience of death.
All you experience is life. And that raises the question, what do you make of your life? Not of mine or your neighbor's, but your own. That's the one you are primarily responsible for, to God almighty. In these several parables, when our lord talks about giving money and and people coming back and telling them what they did with it, notice he doesn't ask what you did with your neighbor's money, what you did to help him do something with his money or whatever whatever in helping to run the farm or whatever he the parable, there are several of them, that our blessed lord uses.
All he asks is, what did you do running the farm that I gave you? What did you do with the talents I gave you? And you can use that figuratively or literally. Do you have money? What are you doing with it?
Do you have talents of mind and of heart, skills? What are you doing with That's the question. That's life. You experience life. You don't experience death.
It happens, but you don't experience it. You may know about it, but it's not an experience. Because your senses go down into that grave, believe me. And so while you have life, do something with it. And death, instead of being a depressing thought, should be an encouraging and inspiring thought.
There is a very touching synopsis of a book in the last issue, the Reader's Digest, about a little girl who soon after her birth was discovered to have an absolutely incurable disease, and how she struggled on for a few years. And it gradually dawned upon her from one you know, from one way or in one way or another, that she was not going to be exactly like other girls in her class. And it finally dawned on her to ask her father, am I going to die? This little girl of about three or four or five, whatever. And the father said to her, Alex, we're all going to die.
Well, you see, great. This is such a cliche that you feel feel silly in saying it, but is there anything more evident in life than death? You know, we can prevent births, but we haven't yet found a way to prevent dying. We could we postpone it. But what's a year or two or three?
Oh, I I'm not just think think think of this mister Schrader and his family. I'm not minimizing. Last night, it was very, very touching on the on the news to see the families that even even if he's only with us a few more hours. That's absolutely wonderful. They're that's a Catholic family, I think.
But there there's nothing wrong in that. There's nothing wrong in in loving life. We should love life. God gave it to us, and everything that it brings, and we should cherish it. But it's not your home.
It's not your home. Just yesterday, I read an article, was a good article, in which the the author concludes, we ought to take care of the earth. It's our only home. Well, if if the earth is our only home, then the heck with it. If that's all we have to live for, then let's make the best of it.
Let's eat and drink and be merry, for tomorrow you die. I have respect for that philosophy. Because happens to be true, that's a sensible thing to do. If it happens to be true, if it happens to be false, it's a tragedy. And so I come back.
We do not experience death. What we experience is life up to the very moment that this happening called death takes place. And the great question is, what do you do with your life? Are you are you oriented? Are you on a course?
Are you centered on the hub of that bicycle wheel, which is God? And if you are, you'll be lined up with all the spokes. In the name of the father, the son, and holy spirit. Amen.