March 4:26 - 34
Blessed Charles De Foucald was 58 years old when he was martyred in Algeria. He had founded a congregation, and a few men had come to join him and gone away again; at his death he was the only member. Blessed Charles was orphaned at 6 and raised by an uncle; he inherited a significant sum from his grandfather and led a wild life. He joined the french cavalry where he was known for his pranks. He resigned from the Calvary and traveled through Morocco, pretending to be a Jew, and out of this experience he wrote an important paper on the culture of the Berber people. When he was about 30 he began practicing his religion again and at 32 joined the Cistercians. This didn’t last too long and he decided to become an hermit in Algeria. He was ordained a priest, and wrote documents on spirituality and a Berber - French dictionary. He was unsuccessful in converting any of the Berbers he lived among, and the order he dreamed of founding never happened.
But back in France, people began to study his writings and a few people wanted to imitate his life of poverty and prayer. Over time his writings have inspired nine religious congregations, including the “little brothers of Jesus” and the “little sisters of Jesus”. There are also eleven associations of lay and religious who try to base their lives on Charle’s spirituality. Charles spiritual descendents can be found all over the world.
Jesus gives us two parables today. On the surface they don’t seem very similar. Mark tells us that he didn’t explain the parables to the crowds, but he did to the disciples. Unfortunately we don’t have those explanations written down.
But Jesus is talking about the Kingdom of God. We all think we know what that means, but I suspect if we took a poll we would have some people thinking this means heaven, others that this describes a far-off future where everything is the way God wants it to be; and still others might see it as a synonym for the Church. And yet, none of these holds up well when we look at Jesus’ many descriptions through his parables. Perhaps a key is in another statement he makes -- the Kingdom of God is within you; and in another palace, he tells a lawyer “You are not far from the kingdom of Heaven”. The kingdom of God is something in each of us, something like a seed, something that we have very little to do with. Jesus sews the seed in us, and somehow, it will grow and bear fruit, and accomplish its purpose, apart from anything we can do to help it or hurt it. In another part of the Gospels Jesus tells his apostles that it was necessary that he had been betrayed by Judas, but woe to Judas who did the betraying. God’s purpose can’t be stopped.
There are times when I feel pretty useless. It’s probably a part of getting older. My kids used to ask me for advice. No longer -- they are all giving advice to their kids. I find I can’t do as much in a day as I used to and I know this is likely to get worse. I am having more and more of those moments when I am speaking and a particular word will not pop up in my brain -- it’s on the tip of my tongue, as they say. And that will probably get worse.
And one day, I, like Blessed Charles, will come to the end of my life and wonder whether it meant anything? Because I’m sure Blessed Charles must have been discouraged when he looked around and asked what his life had accomplished.
But that’s what these two parables are about. You and I don’t really accomplish anything. If anything comes from our having lived our lives, it’s because God planted the seed and sees to it that the seed grows into the kind of plant he wants. And all we can do is live our lives and continue to move in the direction God seems to want for us. Cooperating with God’s grace simply means getting up every morning, turning to God and saying “Speak, your servant is listening” and then going about the tasks of the day, doing them as well as we can. Saint Josemaria Escriva, the founder of Opus Dei, said that for each of us, our sanctification won’t be because of some great work we accomplish -- or that God accomplishes through us, which is a different thing. Our sanctification will be through the work we do. We become holy by making the work holy, and we make the world holy by doing the work as well as we can. And maybe God will use us to build a vast enterprise; or maybe we will become an object lesson about how not to do something. But our holiness is under our control; God’s purpose for us is under His. They are separate things.
So imitate Mary, our mother, who never wrote a word, never founded a religious order, never preached a sermon, never built anything that lasted -- but did everything she had to do as well as she could. And through her God brought forth Jesus and His Church.
