Eleventh Sunday of the Year B (17 Jun 2018)
Homily of Fr. Paul Panaretos, S.J.
Relationship Tracing
In North America a phrase captures investigating minds: Follow the money. It seems to have entered English after Bob Woodward urged Senator Sam Ervin to trace “secret campaign cash.” Tracing it got to the bottom of the 1972 Washington, D.C., Watergate burglary. I was young that summer; its events made me a tracer ever since. I did tracing of a different sort: trees; I traced trees in scripture to follow God through our readings.
My tree-tracing led beyond our first reading and gospel. The bible symbolized people with trees and; vines. In addition to the responsorial, the First Psalm imaged a godly person like a tree: planted by streams of waters that produces its fruit in its season.2 Another psalm echoed Prophet Isaiah singing of God’s people: O God of hosts, restore us….You brought a vine out of Egypt…and planted it. You cleared out what was before it; it took deep root and filled the land. The mountains were covered by its shadow, the cedars of God by its branches.3
Trees and vine stand for people; Jesus likened us to branches on a vine—himself.4 Trees and vines bear fruit; our fruit is our behaviour and actions. We imitate Jesus who is lavish and ever-creative even when we don’t notice: people would sleep and rise night and day and through it all the seed would sprout and grow [and people] know not how…the earth automatically yields fruit. It is less about knowing than about the growing-process that happens independently from us.
God’s desire for the world—kingdom image fit the ancient Mediterranean better than our world—God’s desire Jesus announced with his parables. The mustard seed containing its entire bush indicates God’s desire is among us more than we may think: seed-becoming-bush points to God independently, freely loving us into being each moment.
Jesus welcomed people to walk with him and meet this ever-planting, ever cultivating Gardener-God he called his dear Father. We understand Jesus’ welcome implies more than stepping. St. Paul used it in that richer sense: we walk by faith. Faith shapes our ways in the world—we live by faith.
Faith is our relationship with risen Jesus; our relationship with Jesus affects our lives and shapes how we are in the world. Our heartfelt stirrings let us trace other relationships in our lives. Sharing the faith of Jesus is similar: our share in Jesus’ faith lets us notice how we are with God and God with us. It’s a mutual tracing; we may allow only half of it to happen: I trace how I am with God but give little time and quiet to seek God’s presence. To seek it lets God be present to us, lets God trace us, draw us, plant the tender shoot that I am and each of us is. Any fruit our lives may bear is gift: God’s yield of fruit in me, in you, in us. We’ll never get to the bottom of God’s graciousness to us; yet savouring God’s fruitful gifts in us is more than enough.
In your daily 15 minutes with Jesus this week
- Pause in the company of our triune God creating us each moment.
- Ask Mary and our patron saints to present us to Jesus.
- Chat with him: praise him for becoming human for us; thank him for inviting us to join his journey of faith.
- Ask Jesus for grace and courage to allow God to draw you, to plant you, to nourish you in this life’s garden.
- Close saying slowing the Lord’s Prayer: the prayer Jesus gave us helps us savour the fruit God yields in us and share it more freely with others.
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- Deuteronomy 7.6-7.
- Psalm 1.3.
- Psalm 80.8-11; Isaiah 5.1-7; 27.2-5. It was a favourite image of others prophets: Jeremiah; Hosea; Jesus.
- John 15:1-17.
Link to this homily’s Spiritual Exercise
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Wiki-images by Liné1 Cedrus libani CC BY-SA 3.0; by Reji Jacob Mustard flower CC BY-SA 3.0
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