Homilies | Father Nathan

Father Nathan | Homily

Today’s Readings for Mass During the Day:

First Reading — IS 55:10-11

Responsorial Psalm — PS 65:10, 11, 12-13, 14

The seed that falls on good ground will yield a fruitful harvest.

Second Reading — ROM 8:18-23

Gospel Reading — MT 13:1-23 OR 13:1-9

Whoever has ears ought to hear.”

– MT 13:9

Abundance and the Mystery of God

The church bestowed with an abundance of wisdom. There were very many theologians, through their knowledge and intelligence filled the church with wisdom to explore the love of the lord. One among the greatest theologian that our Holy Mother Church holds them would be St. Thomas Aquinas. He would say” Grace is built on nature” to understand God fully, we need to discover the nature and what is that nature wants to teach to the world. The more and more we understand nature and its sign and symbols and open our eyes and ears to listen and read nature, we will understand the mystery of God.

Roots of Faith

The Moso is a bamboo plant that grows mostly in China and the Far East. Moso bamboo is the largest of the cold-hardy bamboo, growing to a height of 75 feet with a diameter of eight inches.  After the Moso is planted, no visible growth occurs for up to 50 days – even under ideal conditions! Then, as if by magic, it suddenly begins growing to its full height of 75 feet within 42 days. The Moso’s rapid growth is due to the miles of roots it has developed during those two months of getting ready.

The Parable of the Sower

Jesus’ parable of the sower invites us to be patient when we fail to achieve instant results from the preaching we do, and from our exemplary lives of bearing witness to Jesus and his Gospel.

Jesus uses any parable to boost morale: The word “parable” comes from the Greek word “parabole”, which means putting two things side by side in order to confront or compare them.  And that is exactly how Jesus uses parables:  He places a simile from life or nature against the abstract idea of the reign of God.

Jesus’ parable of the seed sown in various soil types was an attempt to boost the morale of his frustrated disciples. They were upset and discouraged because they realized that their master was facing opposition and hostility from the scribes, Pharisees, and priests.

The synagogues refused to admit him to preach. So, Jesus had to go to the beaches and hillsides. Some of the Pharisees were planning to trap him, and the common people were more interested in his ability to heal them than in his preaching. 

Using the parable of the sower in today’s Gospel, Jesus assured his confused disciples that the “Good News” he preached would produce the intended effect in spite of opposition and controversy. Matthew may have included this parable in his Gospel because his own Judeo-Christian community had experienced similar adverse reactions from their fellow-Jews, just as people today are frustrated in their attempt to live the Gospel in our consumerist, hedonist, secularist, materialist, atheistic/agnostic society

How do we respond to the Word of God and his acts?

How do we respond to the Word of God and to the various Acts of God in our lives? Do we allow the trials and tribulations of this world to overwhelm the tender seed growing within us?  Do we pull back when people harass us because we are believers? 

Do we decide, because things are not working out the way we think they ought, that God doesn’t care for us, or that He is powerless, weak, and not to be heeded? Do we allow the cares of this world, our ambitions, or our desires for success and happiness, to choke out the messages that God sends us through the various events of our daily lives and through the various people we encounter?

How we respond to the Word of God is the key to how fruitful the Gospel is going to be in our lives. Unlike the situation in nature, we can, as it were, change the kind of soil that we are.

Sow seeds of encouragement, joy, and reconciliation regardless of the “soil” 

God allows the seed to land on the hard paths, on the rocky ground, and in the thickets of our lives in the hope that in those places it will find a place to mature and bear fruit, that those things which impede growth will be removed, and that the soil maybe just a little deeper than it at first appears to be in those rocky places.

Finally, Jesus challenges us in the parable of the sower to sow seeds of encouragement, joy, and reconciliation regardless of the “soil” on which it is scattered, and to imitate the seed’s total giving of self that becomes the harvest of Gospel justice and mercy.     

See how deeply the word of God has taken root in our lives

The parable of the sower challenges us to see how deeply the word of God has taken root in our lives, how central God is to the very fabric of our day-to-day life.  Jesus also invites his followers to embrace the Faith of the sower: to trust and believe that our simplest acts of kindness and forgiveness, our humblest offers of help to anyone in need, maybe the seeds that fall “on good soil” and yield an abundant harvest.

Have a Blessed Week,

Fr. Nathan