You Don't Always Get What You Want. . .

Fr. Mel Bennett gave the homily at my parish today. He talked about the first reading (1 Kings 17:10-16) which tells the story about the faithful widow woman who only had flour and oil to make her daily meal. Because of her faith, God kept her flour jar and oil jug miraculously full during the coming year. Fr. Mel said that God answers our prayers. He pointed to the widow woman and noted that she probably wanted more variety in her meal: fruit, meat, etc. He then nearly quoted a Rolling Stones song saying: "you don't always get what you want, but if you pray, you get what you need."  And she did. 

I wonder what Mick Jagger was thinking when he wrote the song with a similar title? The lyrics are close: "You can't always get what you want, but if you try sometime, you might find, you get what you need." Huh. Funny how the Gospel crashes through our pop culture sometimes.