Liturgical Colour : Green or White (Saturday Mass of Our Lady)

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today as we all listened to the words of the Sacred Scriptures, we are all reminded of the need for each and every one of us as those who believe in the Lord to contemplate our path in life, our actions and whatever it is that we have done, in all that we carry out in our lives so that our whole lives may always be truly exemplary and be faithful to God, and that we will strive to avoid falling into the temptations to sin, to disobey God and His Law and commandments. We must not allow the evil ones to persuade us otherwise and to mislead us down the path of darkness and ruin, by strengthening our own relationships with God, our Lord and Master, He Who has always loved us all these while.

In our first reading today, we heard from the Book of the prophet Jeremiah in which the prophet of God told the people the words of the Lord at the Temple of God in Jerusalem, which had long been profaned and corrupted by the wicked practices and actions of the people of the kingdom of Judah and Jerusalem. As the Lord Himself said to His people, telling them through Jeremiah how wicked their actions and deeds had been, in their lack of genuine faith in Him and in their many hypocritical actions and deeds, which angered the Lord and would lead them to their doom and downfall. They were to suffer the consequences of their actions, all their deeds in manipulating and persecuting their fellow brothers and sisters for their own selfish ambitions and desires.

God wanted His people at that time in the kingdom of Judah and hence all of us to realise that as His disciples and followers, all of us must realise that each and every one of our actions, words and deeds in life, our interactions and all our dealings with one another have to be accounted for, and we must understand that while God loves us all and does not despise us, all kinds of sins and wickedness are abhorrent to Him, and no sin and evil can stand before God’s Presence, or else we will be condemned and judged by those same sins which we have committed in our lives. That is why we need to turn away from all the wickedness that we ourselves had done in our lives, and embrace once again God’s love and mercy, seeking His forgiveness for our many sins.

Then, in our Gospel passage today, we heard of the words of the Lord speaking to His disciples and the people using the parable of the good seeds and the weeds, in which the Lord spoke of the sower of the seeds, representing God Himself, and the enemy who sowed the seeds of weeds, which represents the devil, the evil one. In that parable, we heard how the seeds of the good seeds grew into good and fruitful plants that grew along the weeds that were competing with them for the nutrients, the space and all the resources needed for them to grow well. Weeds here often refer to those plants that are not useful or beneficial to us, and as competitors to the crop plants are therefore undesirable as they can make the good plants and crops unhealthy and lacking the resources they need to grow well.

However, as we heard, the master and sower of the seeds told his workers not to pluck out the weeds from the field as they were intertwined with the crops and good plants, and if they were to be plucked out, it might kill the good plants as well. This is related to what we have heard in our first reading passage today from the Book of the prophet Jeremiah, reminding all of us that God has always been patient in loving and caring for us, and within each and every one of us God has sowed the seeds of faith and love, all the blessings and graces He has bestowed upon us. However, at the same time, the devil and the other evil ones have also sowed in us the seeds of disobedience, doubt and evil, trying to compete with the love and truth that God has planted in each and every one of us.

Now, brothers and sisters in Christ, with regards to which among these seeds will grow and prosper within us, it depends on what kind of condition we are giving to them. If we live our lives in a manner that is truly worthy and committed to God, then within us the seeds that the Lord had sown in us will grow and prosper most bountifully. How can we do this, brothers and sisters in Christ? It is by doing what the Lord has taught us to do, by living our lives centred on Him and loving Him above all else, and ever growing deeper in our relationship with Him, as well as in our love for our fellow brothers and sisters, our fellow men around us. It is by truly embodying and living up to our faith in God that we can be truly worthy of God’s grace and salvation, and be brought into eternal glory and happiness that have been prepared for us.

On the other hand, if we allow ourselves to be swayed and tempted by the evil one and if we live our lives without following and obeying what God has commanded us all to do, and if we show injustice and selfish behaviours to others, causing hurt and sufferings for others in order to fuel and satisfy our own desires and personal ambitions, then all these will cause the seeds of disobedience, doubt and evil to grow within us, bringing us ever more distant and further away from God and His grace. We must realise that in the end, if we continue to walk down this path, although we may enjoy and find it more pleasurable and easier in life, but we will be judged and condemned by all the sins we committed, and in the end, what we may have is nothing less than eternal damnation.

Let us all therefore no longer be ignorant of what we need to urgently do in order to seek God’s forgiveness for our many sins, and for us to reorientate our lives so that we may once again live them in accordance with God’s will. Let us all be good role models, examples and inspiration for our fellow brothers and sisters, that in all the things we do and carry out in each and every moments, we will always strive to cultivate a life that is truly holy and worthy of God. May the Lord continue to strengthen and empower us all so that we may always be faithful to Him at all times, and may He grant us the strength and the courage to carry on living our lives ever more courageously and worthily as good and devout Christians, as God’s holy and beloved people, now and always. Amen.