Brothers and sisters in Christ, today we listened to Jesus explaining the meaning behind the parable of the weeds and the sower which He had told to His disciples and the people of Israel. He told them that the fate awaiting the wicked ones is death and eternal suffering in hell, while the fate awaiting the righteous ones is eternal joy and bliss in heaven, with our Lord, reunited in perfect goodness and glory of God.

The seeds of the weeds spread by the devil is the evil and corruption he had spread in this world to lead mankind astray from their path towards the Lord. The seeds of evil are greed, wrath, hatred, lust, jealousy, despair, arrogance, and pride. They are our weaknesses that made us prone to fall into the damnation reserved for the devil and his fallen angels, the fate of the weeds. This is because, as we all know, weeds are dangerous, because they compete with the healthy plants for nutrition, and when the weeds grow large, they also may likely strangle the healthy plants and kill them.

The same therefore is bound to happen to all of us, if we do not take precautions against the devil and his mischievous tools, all the tools in the world that he possesses to be employed against us, the beloved children of God. The devil is the sower of the evil weeds of sin, that if we are not careful, will grow within us and around us, and choke the good that is in us, turning us from the path of salvation into the path towards doom.

Our Lord and God, as Moses had said in the first reading we heard today, is a merciful and loving God, One who is slow to anger and rich in kindness and compassion. He is sure to welcome us back into His embrace if we are to be repentant and truly regret our sins and our wrongdoings before Him. We must not be shy to admit that we have sinned before God, because He is our loving Father, and He wants to rescue us from certain death.

But He is also a jealous God, a God who is just and against any form of sin. That is because He is perfect goodness and sin is corruption that had marred our perfection ever since the times of Adam and Eve, when Satan tricked Eve into eating the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil and disobeyed the Lord in the process. It is because of our disobedience that we deserved death, and Adam and Eve deserved death and annihilation, and yet God showed them mercy and although they were punished to live in great difficulty on earth, they were not annihilated.

Death did claim them and our ancestors in the end, but death would not have the final say. That was because the Lord Himself gave His all so that we may have a new hope for eternal life in Him, to return us to our true inheritance, as what God had originally intended for us at creation. He did not desire us to suffer or die, but He wants us all to live, forever with Him in the bliss of heaven, to spend all our time in the beautiful Gardens of Eden.

He sent us His only Son, Jesus Christ, to be the fulfillment of His long-awaited promise, that He would send a redeemer to all mankind. The ultimate proof of His love and care for us. So great is His love that He is willing to suffer in our place, to die in our place, and to be our light of hope. He is the light of hope and salvation, because He did not remain in the land of the dead, but by the power of the Lord, He broke free the chains of sin and death that had held us for generations, and risen from the dead He became the source of salvation for all who believe in Him.

We must sow the seeds of faith, of hope, and of love in our hearts, brothers and sisters in Christ, so that we will be ever ready to combat the seeds of evil that Satan and his cronies always try to sow within our hearts. Do not be afraid, for he no longer has any power or authority over us, ever since Christ broke that bond that enthralled us to the evil one. We must however remain ever vigilant and ever careful, lest the devil successfully subvert our thoughts and our hearts to be against the Lord and His will.

Let us strive to be the wheat and not the weeds, and may the seeds of faith, hope, and love that is within us grow strong, that they become the nutrients and fertiliser that help us, the wheat to grow strong and bear much fruits, that the Lord who sees us, will be pleased and He will then tell His angels to come and collect us from amongst the weeds and bring us to Him, to enjoy forever His grace, His blessings, and His loving embrace.

Today, brothers and sisters, we also commemorate the Feast of St. Peter Chrysologus, who was made a Bishop of Ravenna in the ending years of the Roman Empire during the early Church. He was well known for his inspiring speeches and preaching, that called all Christians to be faithful to God and defend themselves against any form of heresies that threatened to corrupt their soul and their true faith in God.

At the time of St. Peter Chrysologus, at the heyday of the Roman Empire, there existed numerous heresies of the faith, many of which were really serious threat on the unity of the Church and the faithful, and some of them had ideas diametrically opposite to the truth of the Apostolic Fathers, the truth that is of Christ. Many of them, corrupted by the seeds of evil, the weeds planted by the evil one, subverted the words of the Lord and the message of salvation to serve their own ends, and ultimately, serve the cause of evil.

Many people fell victim to the corrupting nature of these heresies, which attacked the truth about our faith in the Lord, in the Lord Himself, and even His Blessed Mother, Mary. St. Peter Chrysologus, as the then Bishop of Ravenna in today’s Italy, was faced with the same problems and challenges that faced the Church of his time. Yet, he did not waver nor did he become afraid to confront those challenges. Instead, he faced them courageously, and with great zeal and inspiration, through his sermons, he converted the faithful back to the truth of Christ, getting rid of the weeds that choked the life out of the faith of the people of God.

Today, my brothers and sisters in Christ, the need is ever greater for more people like St. Peter Chrysologus, in defending our faith and ourselves, from the corruption that comes from Satan. We must be courageous in standing up for the Lord in the face of the devil and bluntly reject all his approaches and his temptations to us. We must stand up for the Lord and His love, His compassion for us. Never let go of the Lord and embrace evil, no matter how difficult the challenges of life are. We must always be strong, as St. Peter Chrysologus had been.

Therefore, brothers and sisters in Christ, let us today renew our commitment to God, to the Lord who loves us, to God who cares for us every day of our life, and commit ourselves to glorify His Name among men, and to never give in to the allures of the evil one, and be courageous to reject all of his approaches. May the Lord who is love and who is mercy, forgive us our sins, purify us and make us whole once again. St. Peter Chrysologus, pray for us sinners and intercede for us before the Lord our God. Amen.