Fr Columba McCann OSB
Jesus didn’t fit the mould. A normal rabbi would be surrounded by people who were clearly religious and of good moral standing. But the circle around Jesus included quite a few shady characters, including those whose finances were corrupt and others who weren’t exactly
paragons of purity. A very mixed bag indeed, and it got Jesus into a lot of hot water. A good rabbi doesn’t have people like that in his circle. A good Catholic Church is not supposed to have bigots, climbers, cheats and hypocrites; it should be full of people who are good, loving,
just and compassionate.
Today’s parable of the wheat and the weeds would have helped Jesus’ contemporaries to see that things are not so simple. It’s not our job to be sorting out the good people from the bad; that’s God’s job, and he will do all of that in good time. Meanwhile he is working gently and
patiently with all of us. God doesn’t want us to panic about what seems like a mass of weeds in our society, our church, our neighbourhood, our family. God is confident that the wheat will survive.
The mixture of weeds and wheat seems to extend even into Jesus’ inner circle. Among the twelve apostles is a terrorist, a traitor and a man who promises the sun, moon and stars, only to disown Jesus when things get too hot. This crowd are so slow to get Jesus’ message that
even at the Last Supper they are bickering over who is the greatest; and in fact they all run away just when Jesus could do with some support. It seems more like a bunch of weeds with no wheat at all. Yet again, it’s not that simple…
The particular kind of weed mentioned in today’s gospel actually looks a lot like wheat. It’s hard to tell the weeds and wheat apart early on. In fact the apostles turned out to be the finest of wheat in the end, giving their lives for the gospel which they worked to spread across the
Mediterranean. God is the only one who knows what’s really going on in someone’s life and the direction in which they will final grow. God would prefer that people live good lives, but he can even use those who do wrong to achieve his purpose, even the weeds. We can think of the story of Joseph, sold into slavery in Egypt by his brothers, only to become the one who, in the end, becomes powerful enough in Egypt to provide food for his family when they are near starvation. We can think of King David, who committed adultery with Bathsheba and murdered her husband; yet it is from the son of David and Bathsheba that the lineage of Jesus himself is traced. We can think of the early disciples who had to flee Jerusalem because of bitter persecution; but God used their journey of escape to spread the gospel throughout Judea, up to Samaria and beyond. We can think of St Paul who got so much hassle in his preaching that he ended up in Roman custody
facing charges; but God used that to get him safely to Rome itself where he could share the good news unhindered. God knows all about the weeds and can work with them and around them.
The devil, on the other hand, is really happy when we get worked up about the failings of others. When I’m thinking that someone else is weed rather than wheat, then I’m distracted from my proper objective. My focus is supposed to be towards God, not towards blaming others; towards God so that I grow into the kind of person who will bear fruit for others.
Monastic tradition speaks of a kind of religious zeal that is bitter: finding fault always with others, confusing and upsetting them by our judgements; whereas true zeal makes us humble and merciful towards the other, just like God. It says all over the monastic tradition that the
closer we get to God, the less we even notice the faults of others. That’s because the log in our own eye is getting smaller, and we realise that in the eye of the other is only a splinter. St Mother Teresa of Calcutta used to say that if you want to reform the world, reform
yourself. The best way to reform my family, my Church, my society, is to reform myself, by turning constantly to God for help.
As we gather around the table of the Lord, perhaps we are not so different from those who gathered around him long ago, scandalising the upright and the pious. We are a mixed bag. Each of us could say, ‘Thank God we are a mixed bag; that means there is a place for me.’
God is very gentle with those who are not reaching the target. You can’t get a gentler way of coming among us than under the simple signs of bread and wine. God knows only too well what needs fixing, and is constantly at work make things right.