Broadcasting

Homily for Friday of the Sixteenth Week in Ordinary Time

Both readings for today’s liturgy depend upon our willingness to listen and hear the word of God. Our response to what has commonly been called the ten Commandments, as well as our response to the parable of the sower and the seed, describe in some detail our relationship to God.

Down through the ages, prophets have delivered God’s message, God’s word. However, in the experience of Mount Sinai, God delivers the message personally. Our response to the commandments ask us to be in right relationship with God and with our neighbor. These commandments have become so much a part of our lives that we tend to use them to examine our consciences at the end of the day and before we celebrate the Sacrament of Penance.

The parable of the sower reminds us that God delivers the message to all people, even people who do not usually accept the Word of God. The method that a first century sower used in sowing the seed is called, oddly enough, broadcasting. As the sower walks through the field, he takes handfuls of seed and throws it around himself. Farmers and farm machinery today plant seed in a much more organized and deliberate pattern. However, the method of broadcasting the seed fits God’s message more closely because God’s word falls on all sorts of different soil, on all sorts of different people.

In both the reading from the Book of Exodus and the Gospel of St. Matthew, it is important to remember that it is not enough to simply hear the Word of God. We must let the word that we hear and the body and blood of Jesus which we receive take root in our lives and change us. In being changed ourselves, we are given the power to change the world. We bear fruit for the kingdom, allowing it to grow in abundance and in love. It is not enough to simply hear the Word, we must also act upon it.