“As iron sharpens iron, so man sharpens his fellow man.” (Proverbs 27:17).
The Joe Catholic blog is intended to provide Catholics and non-Catholics with resources to assist them in answering God's call to holiness. Our goal is to help people learn their faith, so they can live their faith and share their faith.
Today's Gospel is one we are all quite familiar with - The Parable of the Sower. Matthew's depiction is taken from the 13th Chapter of Matthew which has been called the parabolic discourse because it contains seven different parables.
According to the commentary in the Ignatius Catholic Study Bible (RSV), the parable demonstrates "how indifferent responses to the word of the kingdom (13:19) prove unfruitful (CCC 29)." On the flip side of this, the responsive heart bears bountiful fruit (13:23).
This seems to me to be consistent with our focus on Learn, Live and Share. What I mean is that most of us follow this pattern. First encounter Christ through some type of conversion experience. If we are properly disposed, this in turn leads us to seek out spiritual formation. As we are formed in the faith, we are moved to bear fruit, to evangelize. This parallels the experience outlined in Pope Paul VI's encyclical, Ecclesiam Suam: awareness, renewal and dialogue.
As we reflect on today's Gospel, we should consider what we are doing to bear fruit. Furthermore, we should also contemplate the ways we can make ourselves more available to God's Word.
The sower went out to sow, to scatter the seed at all the crossroads of this earth. What a blessed task we have. We have the job of making sure that in all the circumstances of time and place the word of God takes root, springs up and bears fruit. (The Forge, 970)
Today was the 46th World Communications Day celebrated by the Catholic Church. The Church has embraced the use of media technology as an evangelization tool for quite some time. The Church may not have anticipated the creation of the Internet (thanks Al Gore), but she did have the foresight to know that media would play a key role in evangelization in the 20th and beyond.
Pope Paul VI in his first World Communications Day (WCD) address said:
It is necessary, however, that the efforts of the workers in the field of social communications be seconded by the united cooperation of all, for it is the responsibility of all that is put to the test: that of parents who are the first, irreplaceable educators of their children; that of teachers whose task it is to instruct their pupils in the knowledge and understanding of the language of modern techniques, showing them how to appreciate what is put forward, how to use these means sensibly with moderation and self-discipline. The responsibility of young people is brought into play, for they are called upon in a high degree to exploit these instruments in their own personal education as well as in the promotion of brotherhood and peace among men. The public authorities too exercise their responsibility in the furtherance and the defence of the common good with due respect for true liberty. (Church and Social Communication, 1967)
Today the Church celebrates the Conversion of St. Paul. St. Paul's conversion is such a big deal that the Church sets aside a special day to reflect upon it. I can't think of another feast day on the Church calendar that celebrates any other person in such a manner.
Saul, as he was named before his conversion, was a Jewish zealot intent on persecuting Christians. Saul journeyed to Damascus "so that if he found any belonging to the Way, men or women, he might bring them bound to Jerusalem" (Acts 9:1). God had a different plan for Saul. While he was traveling to Damascus, Jesus appeared to Saul in a flash of light. Saul "fell to the ground and heard a voice saying to him, 'Saul, Saul, why do you persecute Me?' And he said, 'Who are you, Lord?' And He said, 'I am Jesus whom you are persecuting' (Acts 9:4-5). Some biblical scholars dispute the accuracy of Caravaggio's famous painting which depicts Saul falling from a horse. The commentators of the Navarre Bible posit "Saul and his associates, who would probably have been mounted, would have had no difficulty in doing the journey in under a week." Personally, I like the image of Saul falling off his high horse. Isn't that what often happens to us right before we turn to God?
Saul was literally blinded by the light of the Truth. Soon after Saul encounters Ananias, who baptizes him and lays hands on Saul (a symbol of commissioning and ordination). Paul became the Lord's vessel, His instrument for good. Paul spread the Word to gentiles throughout the world and is known as the Apostle to the Gentiles.
Paul's response to God's call is an example for all of us. Pope Paul VI explains:
"The apostolate is [...] an inner voice, which makes one both restless
and serene, a voice that is both gentle and imperious, troublesome and affectio-
nate, a voice which comes unexpectedly and with great events and then, at a
particular point, exercises a strong attraction, as it were revealing to us our life
and our destiny. It speaks prophetically and almost in a tone of victory, which
eventually dispels all uncertainty, all timidity and all fear, and which facilitates--
making it easy, desirable and pleasant--the response of our whole personality,
when we pronounce that word which reveals the supreme secret of love: Yes;
Yes, Lord, tell what I must do and I will try to do it, I will do it. Like St. Paul,
thrown to the ground at the gates of Damascus: What would You have me do?
"The roots of the apostolate run deep: the apostolate is vocation, election, interior encounter with Christ, abandonment of one's personal autonomy to His will,
to His invisible presence; it is a kind of substitution of our poor, restless heart,
inconstant and at times unfaithful yet hungry for love, for His heart, the heart of
Christ which is beginning to pulsate in the one who has been chosen. And then
comes the second act in the psychological drama of the apostolate: the need to
spread, to do, to give, to speak, to pass on to others one's own treasure, one's
own fire. [...]
"The apostolate becomes a continuous expansion of one's soul, the exuberance
of a personality taken over by Christ and animated by His Spirit; it becomes a
need to hasten, to work, to do everything one can to spread the Kingdom of God,
to save other souls, to save all souls" ("Homily", 14 October 1968).
When I was about sixteen years old, ABC ran a mini-series called Peter and Paul, starring Anthony Hopkins as St. Paul. While the movie was not completely accurate in its portrayal of biblical events, it did strike a chord with me. To this day, when I proclaim a reading from St. Paul's epistles at Mass, I think of Anthony Hopkins' portrayal. Here is a clip from the movie depicting St. Paul's conversion.
