Sixteenth Sunday Ordinary

Sixteenth Sunday Ordinary
July 17, 2005

"... Your might is the source of justice; your mastery over all things makes you lenient to all... those who are just must be kind..." (Wisdom 12:13-19) '... if you pull up the weeds you might uproot the wheat along with them. Let them grow together until harvest; (Matthew 13 24-43)

The Wisdom author reflects on God's power and benevolence, associating power with justice and leniency, and drawing a parallel between this and a prescription for human behavior. From God's point of view strength and justice are not associated with punishment and retribution, but with love and forbearance. This might not be a bad thing to remember in this age of indiscriminate, apparently deliberate attacks on innocent people. It should however cause us to reflect on our own tendencies toward political and religious fanaticism, the conviction that we are right and everyone else is wrong and that it is our duty to purify the world. Precisely the mentality of terrorism.

Jesus instructs about the kingdom of God in parables, comparing it to a field of grain choked with weeds, a tiny mustard seed or a bit of yeast in a mass of bread dough. The disciples naïvely ask the master if he wants them to destroy the "weeds", meaning those who apparently reject his teaching. Jesus' answer is consistent with the passage from Wisdom. He says essentially to leave it all alone until his Father decides on the right time to allow the weeds to be separated from the grain. It is not for them to take this decision into their own hands. Who knows what will happen between now and harvest time.

Jane has created a beautiful English style garden in our yard against a backdrop of large fir and oak trees. Once upon a time I spent much energy trying to keep this little quarter acre of woods "under control". Now the weeds (grass) are high enough to provide food and cool shelter for a family of deer. Jane and a friend spend countless hours pruning and weeding her garden to keep it looking great. She recently remarked that she had forgotten to enjoy it fully during the brief spring blooming, so intent was she on making sure that everything was just right. Maybe there is a lesson here. What are undesirable "weeds" at one time and place may not be so at another in the kingdom of God, as in the garden. Sometimes we must allow time to discern the difference instead of jumping rashly to conclusions about what is and is not desirable. The spiritual life is full of such ambiguities The kingdom of God, within and around us is not always served best by pursuing our manias for order and purity. Better to leave the final sifting for the Most High.