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July 11, 2017In this week’s gospel, Jesus speaks to the crowd the parable of the Sower of Seeds. The Sower casts a multitude of seeds over a variety of soils: only the seeds that fall on the rich soil flourish. Jesus ends his parable saying “whoever has ears ought to hear.” Matthew included this story in his Gospel to speak to an agricultural community, but how do we understand this parable today? Just as our lawns require tending to stay lush and green through the seasons, we must tend the soil of our hearts so that we are able to see and hear God’s presence in our lives. Our ability to hear God’s voice depends on patient, regular attention, and growth may be gradual and hard to see.
During the two weeks of our Summer Faith program, now in progress, nearly 200 of our children, assisted by a committed group of adults and teens, are learning together how to hear the Word of God in their lives. Through song, church teachings, and scripture, they learn to have ears that hear God’s voice in everything they do. The learning is all presented in a way they can understand, increasing in depth and complexity as the children mature. The ultimate goal, as catechists and as parents, is to help young disciples learn to tend their own gardens and nourish the seeds God the Sower has planted in their hearts.
The process of discerning God’s presence in our lives does not end in Elementary School, or even after all formal education is over. We continue to patiently till the soil of our hearts throughout our lives, sometimes not seeing the benefits until much later. I recently spent time with a new parishioner, who recounted how his travels to the Holy Places of Europe had transformed his life in many ways. In one such journey soon after his retirement, he traveled “In the Footsteps of Saint Paul,” through the places where Paul had started Christian communities in Turkey and parts of modern Greece. Even now at Mass, he hears “A reading from the letter of St. Paul to the Ephesians” and remembers how he felt standing in the place to which Paul was writing. His faith deepened and was enriched in ways he couldn’t know back then: an unexpected sprout from a seed planted twenty years ago. Life-long faith, to be sure!
In our own lives, and as we walk with others as parents, catechists, and friends, we may wonder if there is a purpose or benefit to our slow, patient efforts. A prayer attributed to Blessed Oscar Romero, gives us hope: “We water seeds already planted, knowing that they hold further promise.” Perhaps we won’t see the results of our work right away. We wait impatiently for “ears that hear.” But with the joyful hope of God, the enthusiastic Sower of Seeds, we continue praying, learning, and listening. In God’s time, and with God’s grace, we will be “the one who hears the word and understands…who indeed bears fruit and yields a hundred or sixty or thirtyfold.”
(Blessed) Archbishop Oscar Romero Prayer: A Step Along The Way
It helps, now and then, to step back and take a long view.
The kingdom is not only beyond our efforts, it is even beyond our vision.
We accomplish in our lifetime only a tiny fraction of the magnificent
enterprise that is God's work. Nothing we do is complete, which is a way of
saying that the Kingdom always lies beyond us.
No statement says all that could be said.
No prayer fully expresses our faith.
No confession brings perfection.
No pastoral visit brings wholeness.
No program accomplishes the Church's mission.
No set of goals and objectives includes everything.
This is what we are about.
We plant the seeds that one day will grow.
We water seeds already planted, knowing that they hold future promise.
We lay foundations that will need further development.
We provide yeast that produces far beyond our capabilities.
We cannot do everything, and there is a sense of liberation in realizing that.
This enables us to do something, and to do it very well.
It may be incomplete, but it is a beginning, a step along the way, an
opportunity for the Lord's grace to enter and do the rest.
We may never see the end results, but that is the difference between the master
builder and the worker.
We are workers, not master builders; ministers, not messiahs.
We are prophets of a future not our own.
Bishop Ken Untener of Saginaw
*This prayer was composed by Bishop Ken Untener of Saginaw, drafted for a homily by Card. John Dearden in Nov. 1979 for a celebration of departed priests. As a reflection on the anniversary of the martyrdom of Bishop Romero, Bishop Untener included in a reflection book a passage titled "The mystery of the Romero Prayer." The mystery is that the words of the prayer are attributed to Oscar Romero, but they were never spoken by him.
From the website of the USCCB, United States Conference of Catholic Bishops
http://www.usccb.org/prayer-and-worship/prayers-and-devotions/prayers/archbishop_romero_prayer.cfm
