Homily – Fr. James Conner – July 16, 2023 – “We are called to love God, one another, and the creation that God has given us”
15th Sunday of Year – A
In today’s gospel we hear Jesus once again using vivid imagery of nature to strive in a parable to make his point. He tells us that the kingdom of heaven is like a sower sowing seed in the ground. But the fruitfulness of the seed depends on the quality of the soil. It might be rocky soil where the seed cannot grow; it might be soil filled with thistles and thorns where the seed is unable to grow; or it might be rich soil which produces fruit in abundance.
We tend to think that Jesus is speaking of this only in relation to individual persons – beginning with myself. While it is true that Jesus is primarily concerned with the individual hearers of the word, yet the readings as a whole show us that the Word of God is directed to a much more vast audience than ourselves.
While it is certainly true that the Son of God became flesh and died for MY sake – St Paul tells us that Jesus loved ME and gave his life for MY sake/ Yet He also loved each and every person, each and every creature, each and every element of creation and gave his life to initiate the New Creation of heaven and earth/
The first reading from Isaiah tells us that God sends the rain and snow to water the earth, making it fertile and fruitful, thus foreshadowing the new creation of heaven and earth. Likewise Paul in the second reading tells us that creation as a whole waits with eager expectation for the revelation of the children of God. Scripture also tells us elsewhere that we are awaiting a new heaven and a new earth.
Hence when Jesus calls us to tend our souls in such a way as to bring ourselves into conformity with God’s plan for a new heaven and a new earth, he is telling us that God’s plan for all creation is a plan of love. a plan for the salvation of all peoples and of all creation. And our personal efforts at heeding the call of God’s love is a way of participating in the final new creation.
But our world of today is far from what God’s love plans. The earth today is not only filled with thorns and thistles, but is all too often sown with land mines and torn apart by bombs. It is far from God’s plan for a new creation. The fears about increasing climate and increasing storms which we experience even in our current climate manifest how far we are from the world such as God plans for the new creation. This shows that it is not simply a problem for science, but ultimately a problem of whether we heed the Word of God, whether we respond to the call of God’x Word.
Our response can determine not only our own personal salvation, but but the fulfillment of God’s plan for the salvation of the world – not just the individual persons, but the whole of God’s creation.
We must remember that God created man and woman only on the sixth day. Each day prior to that. God created new elements of creation, and at the end of each day God looked on what He had done and saw that it was good. So while humans are the peak of creation, yet they are not the only thing of interest to God. When the Son of God became man, He took on all the elements of humanity, including our sharing in all of nature. And when Jesus plans to share Himself most fully with us. He does so through the basic elements of nature – namely, bread and wine. In that He is not only sanctifying nature but He is making it a part of His plan for the salvation of the world – including all of nature and all persons. We are called to assist in this divine plan by responding to Jesus’ call to love God and to love one another and to love the creation He has given us out of love.