July 20^th 2014. SIXTEENTH SUNDAY OF ORDINARY TIME

Gospel: Matthew 13:24-43

Translated from a homily by Don Fabio Rosini, broadcast on Vatican Radio

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GOSPEL:                                                       Matthew 13:24-43
Jesus put a parable before the crowds, ‘The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a man who sowed good seed in his field. While everybody was asleep his enemy came, sowed darnel all among the wheat, and made off. When the new wheat sprouted and ripened, the darnel appeared as well. The owner’s servants went to him and said, “Sir, was it not good seed that you sowed in your field? If so, where does the darnel come from?” “Some enemy has done this” he answered. And the servants said, “Do you want us to go and weed it out?” But he said, “No, because when you weed out the darnel you might pull up the wheat with it. Let them both grow till the harvest; and at harvest time I shall say to the reapers: First collect the darnel and tie it in bundles to be burnt, then gather the wheat into my barn.”

He put another parable before them, ‘The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed which a man took and sowed in his field. It is the smallest of all the seeds, but when it has grown it is the biggest shrub of all and becomes a tree so that the birds of the air come and shelter in its branches.’

He told them another parable, ‘The kingdom of heaven is like the yeast a woman took and mixed in with three measures of flour till it was leavened all through’.

In all this Jesus spoke to the crowds in parables; indeed, he would never speak to them except in parables. This was to fulfil the prophecy:
I will speak to you in parables
and expound things hidden since the foundation of the world.

Then, leaving the crowds, he went to the house; and his disciples came to him and said, ‘Explain the parable about the darnel in the field to us’. He said in reply, ‘The sower of the good seed is the Son of Man. The field is the world; the good seed is the subjects of the kingdom; the darnel, the subjects of the evil one; the enemy who sowed them, the devil; the harvest is the end of the world; the reapers are the angels. Well then, just as the darnel is gathered up and burnt in the fire, so it will be at the end of time. The Son of Man will send his angels and they will gather out of his kingdom all things that provoke offences and all who do evil, and throw them into the blazing furnace, where there will be weeping and grinding of teeth. Then the virtuous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father. Listen, anyone who has ears.

The Gospel of the Lord: Praise to you Lord Jesus Christ

Kieran’s summary . . . When read together, the three parables in Sunday’s Gospel reveal the wholly positive nature of Jesus’ presentation of the kingdom of God. The master sows wheat in the field, but an enemy sows poisonous darnel while everyone is sleeping. This is symptomatic of each of our lives. We have been doubly planted: God has sown the good seed in us, but the evil one plants negative suggestions in our hearts on a daily basis. Why does the master in the parable not permit the servants to remove the darnel from the wheat before harvest time? Because the master knows that the good seed will come to fruition anyway. It is a wrong emphasis to be preoccupied with the negative elements in our lives. These things will wither and die if we focus our attention completely on the wonderful elements that the Holy Spirit has planted within us! The parable of the mustard seed and the parable of the yeast emphasize the power of the good seed that has been gifted to us. The mustard seed begins from nothing and becomes the finest shrub in the garden. The yeast is only a tiny constituent of the ingredients for the bread, but it has a huge influence on the final product. In the same way, the good seed that the Lord has planted in us will eliminate all the negative aspects from our lives if we only concentrate on it and allow it to come to fruition.

The three parables in the Gospel must be understood in the light of the fact that God’s principal concern is for our good

The parable of the darnel always goes hand in hand with the parable of the mustard seed and the parable of the yeast. The first reading provides us with a key with which we can understand the unity of the three parables. This beautiful reading from the Book of Wisdom tells us how God cares for everything. His power is displayed in the way that he indulges everyone. In what does this “indulgence” consist? It regards the way in which God confronts our errors and frailty. The principle by which the Lord governs the universe is a principle of mildness, a principle of seeking our pardon and reconciliation. This is the key with which we must approach the three parables.

Throughout life we are the target of good inspiration from the Holy Spirit and negative suggestions from the evil one. How should we respond to this fact? Should we be focus on weeding out the negative elements?

The master sows the good wheat in the field, but bad seed is sown by the enemy when everyone is asleep. This is an image of what can happen when there is distraction and a lack of vigilance. It is profoundly true that in each of our lives there is a double sowing. We receive the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, but we also receive the suggestions and disturbances of the spirit who is the enemy of humanity. Our lives go on amid this mixture of inspiration and disturbance. The inspirations are illuminating and lucid, whilst the suggestions are tortuous and anything but clear. Our hearts are the arena in which this drama plays itself out. The master’s priority is to salvage the good seed, whilst the servants are more preoccupied with rooting out the darnel. But the act of trying to weed these negative suggestions out of the heart of man is futile. The suggestions of the evil one will always be present in our lives. An overriding preoccupation with weeding out the darnel is a waste of time. It is also risky because it can be sometimes quite difficult to distinguish the suggestions of temptation from true inspiration.

The good seed of God has the power to overcome all our defects. We do not need to focus on those defects in an obsessive way. Let us just focus on this wonderful seed that God has placed in the heart of each of us. It will produce a rich harvest if we only allow it!

The two parables that follow are wholly positive, and in this way they throw light on the parable of the wheat and the darnel. The mustard seed is incredibly small, but when it comes to fruition, it produces the largest of the shrubs. In the same way, a tiny bit of yeast in the bread mixture has an enormous impact on the end product. What these parables reveal is that the good seed from God has a power of its own that will overcome everything else. We do not need to be fixated on perfectionism and the rooting out of errors. What we need to do is to be ever more focused on the good seed. We all have defects and fragilities in our lives. We waste our time if we focus on the elimination of these elements, because they tend to keep coming back. It is much wiser to concentrate on the good seed, on the power of this yeast in our lives that has been given to us as a gift. Left to ourselves, we tend to face good and evil off in bloody confrontations, but it is much wiser to focus on the good, allowing evil to die of hunger. The evil elements in our lives will shrink through lack of attention if we only focus on the good. The master says, “Trust in my work! Allow the good seed to come to fruition and you will see that the harvest will be great!” We must look at the good qualities in others, not at their defects. When bad things happen to us, we must not focus on the suffering but on the good consequences that result. The human being always carries within him the good seed, and we must look constantly to it. God is indulgent with everyone, as the first reading says, because he knows that everyone is well endowed with something beautiful and good. Even the person who has done the greatest wrong in the world still carries the good seed within him, and this is what God looks for in him – the fruit of that good seed.