Tuesday of the Seventeenth Week in Ordinary Time

Today's Mass Readings

I was talking to a young man who said he was discerning priesthood, but he listed several fears and anxieties that were stopping him from pursuing it further. I listened, then simply observed that he was giving the Devil a pretty easy fight by simply allowing fear to stop him from following Christ.

The man in Jesus’ parable, who takes the time and energy to sow good seed in the field probably had to fight discouragement when the crops grew and he noticed weeds appearing throughout his field. How frustrating it must have been to know that his hard work was contested and sabotaged by an enemy. His servants thought that the field was completely ruined by the weeds, and they wanted to pull it all up.

This reaction is pretty normal for many people in the world—we encounter something that is displeasing or discouraging and we become overwhelmed by it. We see the evil in the world—the division, violence, corruption, a lack of compassion—and we wonder where God is in the midst of evil. We also encounter poor treatment from others—anger, control, or even the experience of when we put forth our best effort and only met with jealousy or a lack of appreciation. Sometimes as a reaction or defense mechanism we are tempted to respond by become hard-hearted and closed in on ourselves—we don’t want to put ourselves out there again because we fear rejection.

One very common area where we encounter the weeds among the wheat is in our own sinfulness. We become overwhelmed by our sins that we no longer see ourselves as beloved children of God. We fall on a downward slope of hopelessness and do not accept God’s mercy because we view ourselves as undeserving of it. If we focus too much on the weeds or pretend they are not there, we become infiltrated by them and they start to increase and suffocate—sometimes even without our realizing it!

The mysterious dynamic of good and evil is at work in the world, in other people, and in ourselves—but the most important part is how we respond to it—we can shut down and stunt our spiritual and emotional growth, thinking that all is ruined, or we can turn it over to Christ and hope in His grace. Our greatest response is to persevere in the grace we received from the day of our Baptism and to continue to nourish the faith in the Lord. We combat the weeds by patience, perseverance, and choosing to be good wheat, that is, deciding to love Christ and to commit ourselves to conversion of heart.

Reflection by Fr. Paul Sheller, OSB