3rd Week, Friday, Jan 27
Hebrews 10:32-39 / Mark 4:26-34
Don’t give up; Be patient!
Joel Weldon, an expert on human potential, says that it
takes five years for the sprout of a bamboo tree to emerge after the bamboo
seed is planted. Once the sprout does emerge, it soars to a height of 90 feet
in six weeks. Impossible? “Not at all,” says Weldon.
All during those five years, the bamboo seedling has been putting
down an elaborate system of roots—miles of roots. It is this elaborate root
system that enables the plant to grow so miraculously, once nature triggers the
above-ground growing process. The bamboo farmer’s patience finally pays off in
the most remarkable way imaginable.
****
How patient are we, especially with the young and the
elderly? “Lord, give me patience! And give it to me right now!” Anonymous
***
We hear for the first time that the “Hebrews” for whom this
letter was destined had to undergo persecution and various difficulties for
following Christ. The author encourages them vividly to persevere in their
faith, for God is faithful to his promises.
The kingdom of God does not irrupt in our human world with
extraordinary signs and power. It is a patient, modest growth, beginning with a
tiny seed in the personal salvation history of every person, in the salvation
history of humankind. It is constantly threatened by sin, which is the refusal
to grow.
****
There is nothing really nice or good about being down. When
something is down on the ground, it is in a very vulnerable position in that it
will be stepped on. Being on the ground is certainly not at a superior
position. And when we are feeling emotionally down, then we will be prone to
outbursts and other kinds of behaviour that will only drag us further down.
So whether physically, or emotionally, or spiritually, when we are down we will
be vulnerable and prone to all things that are not nice and not good. A phrase
that is often used is that we will call something or someone "down and
out". But does being down also means being out? We say it so
often that it becomes like a mantra: down and out, so much so that when one is
down, it subsequently means that one is out, or has to be out. But when we listen
to the parables of Jesus in the gospel with regards to the seeds, then we will
come to see that down doesn't necessarily mean out.
In fact, down means up, so it is not down and out, but down
and up. The seeds show us that. Only when they are down on the ground or in the
ground that they will begin to sprout and grow and bear fruit and put out big
branches so that the birds of the air can shelter in their shade. Even when the
1st reading talks about sufferings and persecutions and being stripped of everything,
others would see those early Christians as being down and out.
But the 1st reading tells us those early Christians might be
down, but they are down and up. Because they know that they own something that
was better and also it is a lasting reward. But all this reversal of the
world's ideas and the mantra of being down and out, comes from none other than
the Resurrection of Jesus.
In rising from the dead, Jesus showed us that down is not out; in fact, it is
down and up. Anyway, it is also said that what goes down must come up! So,
whenever we feel physically, or emotionally, or spiritually down, let us know
that it is not going to be out.
Let us look at Jesus on the Cross and He will raise us up.
Let us also look at the Sacred Heart of Jesus and know that that is what He
will do. It is a promise from His Heart.
****
Encountering Christ:
1. God Makes the Plant Grow: Farmers work hard.
They worked even harder in Jesus’s time, but for all the work they did, they
couldn’t make a plant grow—even today’s farmers cannot make a plant grow. What
is the farmer’s job then? To help the plant grow. A farmer removes obstacles to
a plant’s growth, like weeds. The farmer also gives the plant what it needs to
grow and be healthy, if necessary, like water and fertilizer. The farmer
provides the best conditions for the plant to grow and the plant responds by
growing. Jesus tells us that his kingdom is like this. We don’t make it grow.
God does. Our job is to provide the best conditions for the kingdom to grow,
first of all in our hearts and then in the hearts of those around us.
2. Small Beginnings: God can bring amazing
results from small beginnings. When the right conditions are present, the
growth of the kingdom is amazing. Jesus compares it to a mustard seed, which is
about the size of a period at the end of a sentence. Yet the full-grown plant
is large. As a boy, I often saw wild mustard as tall as five or six feet, and
under perfect conditions they are supposed to grow as tall as eight feet. Jesus
was emphasizing how small the beginning of the Church would be. So small as to
be almost invisible, the Church would grow to provide shelter to Catholics for
thousands of years.
3. Lazy Farmers: How often we worry about the
Church today. God’s kingdom sometimes seems to be disappearing from our
society. Jesus is telling us in this parable that the opposite should be
happening. With the right care, even a much smaller Church could transform
society. Where are today’s farmers to sow the seeds, to remove obstacles to
growth, to provide what the kingdom needs to grow? It’s only when Christians
are idle that the kingdom shrinks. When we realize that each of us is
responsible for spreading Christ’s kingdom in society, we will see these
parables come to life before our eyes. We will see the unstoppable growth of
the Church.
Conversing with Christ: Lord, I’m sorry for not
realizing, for sometimes forgetting, that I am here to help you in your mission
of bringing all souls to heaven. Please help me to be ready to encourage, to
give good example, to teach those you put in my life.
Resolution: Lord, today by your grace I will
study something about my faith so that I know it a little bit better, and can
be more faithful in the way I live my life and help those who ask me about my
faith.
***
Let us pray: Patient God, curb our impatience
when we try to impose your truth and justice and peace on a world and even a
Church not yet disposed to welcome them. In our helplessness and discouragement
may we come to accept that all true growth comes from you. We can only plant
the seed: make it bloom into a mighty tree that shelters many. We ask this
through Christ our Lord.
***
Feast day January 27
Women like St. Teresa of Ávila and St. Catherine of Genoa
contributed significantly to the Catholic Reformation. But in the 16th-century
church perhaps no woman responded more creatively to the need for reform than
St. Angela Merici. She built communities that trained single women in Christian
living and provided them a secure place of honor in their local societies.
A single lay woman herself, Angela established groups of
unmarried women of all classes in Brescia and other northern Italian cities.
She wanted the women to be in the world, but not of it. So they consecrated
themselves to God and promised to remain celibate. But they lived at home with
their families and looked for ways to serve their neighbors. In 1535, Angela
organized the groups into the Company of St. Ursula, later called the Ursulines.
Unique for its time, her avant-garde association anticipated modern secular
institutes and covenant communities.
Angela gave the Ursulines a military structure, dividing
towns into districts governed hierarchically by mature Christian women. This design
allowed the community to support members in daily Christian living and protect
them from spiritually unhealthy influences.
The rule that Angela wrote for the company required members
to remain faithful to the Christian basics. In the following excerpt, she
explains the importance of daily vocal and mental prayer:
Each one of the sisters should be solicitous about prayer,
mental as well as vocal, that is a companion to fasting. For Scripture says
prayer is good with fasting. As by fasting we mortify the carnal appetites and
the senses, so by prayer we beg God for the true grace of spiritual life. Thus,
from the great need we have of divine aid, we must pray always with mind and
heart, as it is written, “Pray constantly” (1 Thessalonians 5:17 NJB). To all
we counsel frequent vocal prayer that prepares the mind by exercising the
bodily senses. So each one of you, every day will say with devotion and
attention at least the Office of the Blessed Virgin and the seven penitential
psalms (Psalm 6, 32, 38, 51, 102, 130, and 143) because in saying the office we
are speaking with God.
To afford matter and some method in mental prayer, we exhort
each one to raise her mind to God and to exercise herself in it every day. And
so in the secret of her heart, let her say: “My Savior, illumine the darkness
of my heart, and grant me grace rather to die than to offend your Divine
Majesty any more. Guard, O Lord, my affections and my senses, that they may not
stray, nor lead me away from the light of your face, the satisfaction of every
afflicted heart.
“I ask you, Lord, to receive all my self-will that by the
infection of sin is unable to distinguish good from evil. Receive, O Lord, all
my thoughts, words, and deeds, interior and exterior, that I lay at the feet of
your Divine Majesty. Although I am utterly unworthy, I beseech you to accept
all my being.”
At Angela Merici’s death in 1540 she had started 24 groups.
Over the years the Ursulines have flourished as the oldest and one of the most
respected of the church’s teaching orders.
To the long list of authorities Ursulines were to obey—Ten Commandments, Church, parents, civil laws—St. Angela added “divine inspirations that you may recognize as coming from the Holy Spirit.” A refreshing and liberating rule. Also a dangerous one, for when it’s obeyed, the Holy Spirit may act in unexpected ways.
