Homily:
17th Sunday in Ordinary Time – Cycle A
Friends, these last three
weeks, we’ve heard different parables that Jesus used to give his disciples a
picture of the “kingdom of heaven”.
Jesus came, as we know, to make this kingdom a reality, but it wasn’t to
be a kingdom in the world as we know it.
Therefore, Jesus used various parables to help his disciples to get a
sense of what this kingdom will look like when it comes in its fullness. From two weeks ago, we know that Jesus taught
in parables in order to sift out those who would be his disciples from those
who wouldn’t: for those who would be his disciples would strive to understand
the parables and thus follow Jesus in order to increase their understanding,
while those who wouldn’t would get frustrated and turn away from him. Jesus wants intentional disciples, and
so he taught in parables to invite that intentionality in those who would
follow him.
Last week, Jesus used the
parable of the wheat and the weeds to remind us of an important lesson: that
the ruler of the kingdom is both wise and rich.
Wise, because even though his enemy sowed a dangerous weed among his
wheat, he didn’t overreact and try to tear out the weeds because he knew that
he could damage the wheat as well and all would be lost. Rich because even though it would cost double
to harvest the wheat due to having to sort out the weeds, he nonetheless could
afford to do it and so was not threatened by the presence of the weeds. This parable also reminds us that, in this
world, the enemies of the kingdom will be allowed to persist, but at the end of
time they will be separated out and thrown into the fires of hell. Thus, while the enemy may seem to have the
upper hand at this present time, at the end of time, he will be defeated.
More practically, for us, however,
last weekend’s parable reminds us of two things. First, that often the enemies of the kingdom
don’t look much different from its true citizens, much like the plant of the
cockle seed (a weed) doesn’t look much different from wheat. It’s not until these plants grow to maturity
that they can be distinguished from each other: the wheat producing whole
grains in the ear while the cockle plant’s ear is emaciated and thin. Thus, as Jesus said elsewhere, you can tell a
good tree by its fruit: the weed making itself known by its bad fruit. The other practical bit that this parable
teaches us is that we need discernment in order to know what to do about the
presence of the weeds among us. The
farmer in the parable understood that, by the time that it became apparent that
there were weeds sown among his wheat it was too late to dig them up: for to do
so would tear up the wheat, as well, and thus sacrifice the harvest. We, too, need wisdom to know whether it is
more prudent to let the enemies of the kingdom remain among us than to try to
root them out, since we might uproot the “children of the righteous” with them.
Where, then, do we find this
wisdom? Last week I noted that, with
24/7 news stations and social media, we now have a super-abundance of opinions
both about who the weeds are and about what we should do about them. The problem with all of them, I reflected, is
that none of them are operating out of a correct and complete understanding of
the human person and what is good for his/her flourishing. Thus, they lack wisdom. I encouraged us to look, instead, to a body
of teaching called Catholic Social Teaching, whose seven main themes provide a
framework of understanding
about the truth of the human person as someone both unique and unrepeatable and
who nonetheless shares a bond and a common end with every other human person. Unlike the “wisdom” proposed in secular
media, which focuses almost exclusively on solutions based on the principle of
“us or them”, Catholic Social Teaching reminds us that the true solution lies
in us recognizing that the situation is never “us or them”, but rather always
“us with them”. The solution, therefore,
and, thus, the appearance of the fullness of the kingdom, lies in us constantly
deciding and redeciding to become “us for them”.
This
week, Jesus’ parables focus on teaching us how valuable it is to have found the
kingdom. Because these parables are so
familiar to us, we might overlook a couple of their fundamental points and so
I’d like to highlight them for us.
First, the one who finds the kingdom is someone who is looking for
it. Jesus doesn’t specifically say that
the person who found the treasure buried in the field was looking for it, but I
think that we can assume that, whoever buried it, tried to bury it in an
inconspicuous way so that it would not be found. Otherwise, why go through the trouble of
burying it? Thus, we can see, that the
one who found it was, at a minimum, “keeping an eye out” for signs of a buried
treasure and, perhaps, was even actively looking for it. The merchant, Jesus tells us, was
specifically looking for that great find—the “pearl of great price”—which reminds
us also that in order to find the kingdom, we have to be looking for it.
This,
again, requires wisdom. The person who
found the “treasure” buried in the field... how did she know that it was
treasure and not just someone else’s junk that they thought was treasure? How did the merchant know how to recognize
the “pearl of great price” from something that might not be as valuable? They both spent time studying pearls and
valuable artifacts so as grow in wisdom and, thus, discernment of what is truly
valuable and what is junk. One of my
favorite shows is American Pickers, where Mike and Frank travel through
rural United States looking for collections of discarded items in which they
hope to find valuable items that they can buy and sell for a profit. These guys have spent a lot of years studying
these things and so have a wisdom to discern what truly is a buried treasure—a
“pearl of great price”—and what is junk.
Therefore, if we are going to be looking for the kingdom, we have to
know what it really looks like. And so,
what does it look like?
The
kingdom of heaven looks like the fulfillment of the deepest longings of our
hearts. The ancient Greek philosopher
Aristotle summed up this longing in one word: happiness. The deepest longing in our hearts is for
happiness. Thus, the kingdom of heaven
is the fulfillment of that longing for happiness. True happiness is found in being fully who we
are, without lacking anything. Being
made in the image and likeness of God, we become fully who we are when we
become most like God. God is a perfect
communion of persons in one being. We,
as individuals, approach the fullness of who we are the more we are more
intimately united in communion with others.
Marriage is an example of how we do this, but it is not the only
way. Any kind of community of
self-giving is a way that we, as human persons, grow into the fullness of who
we were made to be. In other words, and
somewhat paradoxically, I only fully become “me”, when I more fully become
“we”. The kingdom of heaven, therefore,
can be recognized wherever there are opportunities for human persons to grow in
self-giving communion with one another.
The
second fundamental point of which these parables remind us is that the kingdom
of heaven costs something. In fact, it
costs EVERYTHING! Thus, if we want the
kingdom of heaven, we’re going to have to give something—everything—up. The person who found the buried treasure...
she went and sold EVERYTHING in order to buy the field and, thus, own the
treasure. The merchant found what she
had been searching for and went and sold EVERYTHING in order to buy it. And this was a great risk, no? The one who found the buried treasure had to
hope that, while she was off selling everything she owned, no one else would
beat her to the punch and buy it before she could. The merchant, the same. Because they recognized the value of the
treasure/pearl, however, they abandoned themselves to the risk and thus
acquired the treasure that satisfied the deepest longing of their hearts.
Friends,
it seems very clear to me (and I include myself in this categorization) that
most people today are quite content to sit back and say that the problems we
are facing today will be fixed when everyone else decides to sacrifice what
they hold dear in order make the world better.
The truth of the matter, however, is that the kingdom of heaven will
never be made fully manifest until each and every one of us decides to “go and
sell everything” in order to make it so.
Principally, this means dying to my own attachments to worldly comfort
in order to encounter the “other” in their suffering and striving to relieve
it, but even more fundamentally, this means being ready to sacrifice my own
personal preferences and points of view for the good of others and for the good
of growing in communion with them. This
is hard work, and if you and I don’t choose every day to take it up, we will
never see the kingdom of heaven among us.
Brothers
and sisters, the last parable in the Gospel reading today reminds us of one
other very important point: that the coming of the kingdom of heaven is
inevitable and the only question, in the end, is “Who’s going to be in
it?” Those who are engaged in the works
of righteousness will be in it, while those who aren’t, won’t. These parables, therefore, urge us to give
ourselves to the works of righteousness: daily prayer, frequent celebration of
the sacraments, intentional efforts to do the works of mercy. These are signs that we have given ourselves to
becoming fully who we are: persons united in intimate communion with God and
with others. Not only will this work
safeguard us in righteousness, but it will also make the kingdom of heaven
manifest among us; and who here doesn’t think that we could use a good dose of
the kingdom of heaven right now? Strengthened
by this Eucharist, therefore, through which God gives us wisdom and courage,
let us give ourselves to this good work, through which we glorify God in Christ
Jesus, our Lord, and take our place in his kingdom.
Given at Saint Mary Cathedral:
Lafayette, IN – July 26th, 2020
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