WEEK 16 03 – Year II
The Parable of the Sower:
Optional Memorial of St. Sharbul Makhlūf
(Jer 1:1-10; Ps 71; Mat 13:1-9)
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Each year, when presiding at the Lac St Anne pilgrimage, I would ask the pilgrims in the shrine how many had brought a bible with them. And each year the response is disappointingly the same – just a few hands go up.
The Gospel today about the Parable of the Sower invites us to be rich soil for God’s word to take root and bear fruit in our lives.
James Martin, in his book, Jesus – A Pilgrimage, describes how he discovered the Bay of Parables in the Holy Land. It is most probably the place where Jesus taught this parable from a boat. It is a natural amphitheater, allowing a human voice to carry easily on the water and to be heard.
In his book The Parables of the Kingdom, Dodd defines a parable as “a metaphor or simile drawn from nature or common life, arresting the hearer by its vividness or strangeness, and leaving the mind in sufficient doubt about its precise application to tease it into active thought.”
Protestant theologian Walter Bruggeman reflects, “The deep places in our lives – places of resistance and embrace – are not ultimately reached by instruction. Those places of resistance and embrace are reached only by stories, by images, metaphors and phrases that spell out the world differently, apart from our fear and hurt.”
John Donahue, in The Gospel in Parable, writes, “The parables manifest such a range of images that the everyday world of rural first-century Palestine comes alive in a way true of few ancient cultures.”
That is what struck Martin at the Bay of Parables. That parable came alive for him. He observed that all four types of soil were there, naturally. Jesus used everyday things that he saw and experienced around him as a carpenter in Nazareth. Martin realized Jesus was not talking in generalities – he was talking about that path, these rocks, those weeds, and that good soil.
The Parable of the Sower may refer not only to which individuals are open, or not open, to receiving the Gospel message. It may also refer to those parts of ourselves that are open, and not open. Can you see your whole self as the field and consider what parts are fertile, what parts are rocky, what parts are choked with weeds and what parts are closed to the gospel message?
Where, for example are you open to God’s word in your life? Perhaps you are easily able to find God in your family. That may be your good soil. Where is your rocky soil? Perhaps you are compassionate at work but less so at home, taking out your anger on your family.
Where might you be like the hard path – impervious to the word of God? Unknown to anyone at that time, a child care worker at the Indian Residential School in Beauval was a pedophile who has since then been charged and served time for sexually abusing some of the young students there. In a conversation with the former principal before going to court, he did not deny his actions, but saw nothing wrong in them. He was certainly the hard path in the gospel, which the word of God cannot penetrate.
What part of your life is choked with weeds? Perhaps you desire to follow God but are obsessed with wealth, which chokes off the fruitful growth that God might wish.
To continue the metaphor, God may want to dislodge a few rocks and pull out some weeds in order to clear a space for God’s word to take root. This may take the form of a friend confronting you on some selfish behavior, a sudden recognition of your own stubbornness, or even a period of suffering that opens you to God in a new way. God plows, unearthing the good soil where God’s word can be planted, take root, grow and flourish.
Another important aspect of this parable is that the sower sows indiscriminately. No farmer throws seed around like that – too expensive, but God does. This story illustrates the extravagant love and mercy of God. God does not count the cost, including the price of Jesus death on the cross. The seed is God’s love and God’s word
We can choose as to what kind of soil we want to be: Hard path – no germination or penetration into our minds and hearts; rocky ground where there is a short-lived high or commitment, like many after a workshop or Cursillo; thorns where there is some Christian life, but too many distractions that take over; or good soil where faith in Jesus, commitment to following him, and being his disciples becomes the number one priority in our lives.
Today, the Church honours someone who lived the message of these readings today – who went into the wilderness, who prayed the prayer of the Anawim, who was a contemplative, St. Sharble Makhluf. Joseph Makhluf was born in the mountains of Lebanon in 1828. At the age of 20 he joined a monastery in the Maronite rite, where he took the name of a 2nd century martyr, Sharbel. He lived there as a monk, but longed to live as a hermit in the desert. His superiors granted his wish in 1875 and he spent the next 23 years in a life of fasting, prayer and manual labor. He was famed for his holiness, wisdom and devotion to the Blessed Sacrament. He died in 188 and was canonized in 1977.
What is our attitude to the Eucharist? Vat II teaches full, active participation. Everyone has a ministry. Are we participating fully, or just going through the motions, not really appreciating the depth of this mystery of God’s love shared through Word and Sacrament?
So, let us pray that we might be rich soil for God’s Word to take root, grow and bear fruit in our lives by living out the Eucharist every day.
