26th Sunday after Pentecost, 6th after Epiphany

Today is the 26th Sunday after Pentecost. The readings and prayers are from the 6th after Epiphany. We are winding down the year, looking forward to the birth of Christ. Remember, all time is present to God. Therefore, The beginning of the world, the Flood, Moses, the Prophets and Patriarchs, the Birth of Christ, His death and Resurrection, the past; the present; and the future, are at all times before the Divine throne of God. This is why we have the ETERNAL SACRIFICE of the Altar in our churches, and NOT just the remembrance of the Last Supper. We still have Christ hanging on the Cross. We still have all His teachings, along with all the Apostles and all the Saints, occurring at all times in front of God Himself. When Protestants ask us why we still have Jesus on the Cross, tell them this: St. Paul says that he preaches Christ on the Cross, and if he doesn't, his preaching is in vain. The Catholic Church, His Church, is the ONLY one that teaches this eternal sacrifice. Our Mass is one of sacrifice, not just a meeting place, where we come to congregate. I know that this is just a simple way of putting it, but it's the best I, being nothing, can put forth to you.

Today we hear of the mustard seed and the tree it begins. The Church, along with the seed of the teaching of Christ, is that seed. Look and see how it has grown into a Great tree, for all the world to rest in.


GOSPEL (Matt. XIII. 31-35.) At that time, Jesus spoke this parable to the multitudes: "The kingdom of heaven is like to a grain of mustard-seed, which a man took and sowed in his field: which is the least indeed of all seeds; but when it is grown up, it is greater than all herbs, and becometh a tree, so that the birds of the air come, and dwell in the branches thereof." Another parable he spoke to them: "The kingdom of heaven is like to leaven, which a woman took and hid in three measures of meal, until the whole was leavened." All these things Jesus spoke in parables to the multitude, and without parables he did not speak to them, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophet, saying: I will open my mouth in parables, I will utter things hidden from the foundation of the world.

 
What is here understood by the kingdom of heaven?
The Church and the doctrine of Christ.

 
Why is the Church compared to a grain of mustard-seed?
Because there is a great similarity between them. The mustard-seed, though so small, grows in Palestine so high and so rapidly, that it becomes a broad tree, in which birds can build their nests. In like manner the Church of Christ was in the beginning very small like the mustard-seed, but it soon spread so wide that numberless people, even great philosophers and princes, came to find peace and protection under its branches.

 
Why is Christ's doctrine compared to leaven?
Because like the leaven, which quickly penetrates the flour, and makes it palatable bread, the doctrine of Christ, spreading with surprising swiftness over the then known parts of the globe, gave the Gentiles a taste for divine things and for heavenly wisdom. Thus Christ’s doctrine penetrates him who receives it, sanctifies all his thoughts, words, and deeds, and makes him pleasing to God.

By what means, in particular, was the Church of Christ propagated?
By the omnipotence of God and the miracles which He so frequently wrought to prove the truth and divinity of the Christian religion; the courageous faith, and the pure moral life of the early Christians, which led many pagan minds to accept the doctrine of Christ; and the persecution of Christianity, for, as Tertullian says: "The blood of the martyrs was the seed of the Church." The false doctrine of Mahomet, the erroneous teachings of Luther, Calvin, and earlier and later heretics have, it is true, also spread quickly far and wide; but this is not to be wondered at, for it is easy to lead people to a doctrine that encourages sensuality, and to which they are carried by their evil inclinations, as was the case with the doctrine of the impostor Mahomet, and three hundred years ago with the heresy of Luther; but to spread a doctrine which demands the subduing of the carnal, earthly inclinations, and to bend the will to the yoke of obedience to faith, something more than human eloquence is required.

Thus, the Chancellor of England, Thomas More, who gave his blood for the True Doctrine of Christ, wrote to Luther, who was boasting of the rapid increase of his sect: "It is easy to descend; seducing the people to a bad life is nothing more marvelous than that a heavy stone should fall of its own accord to the ground;" and Melanchton, a friend of Luther, in answer to his mother's question, whether she should remain a Catholic or receive Luther's doctrine, wrote : "In this religion it is easy to live, in the Catholic it is easy to die."

Let hope and pray, and be strong in the Faith that Jesus Christ and the Apostles taught, so that we may be able to die in that Faith, if God so wishes.


We will end with the prayer from the Antiphon at the end of Vespers:

Grant, we beseech Thee, O almighty God, that ever meditating on such things as are reasonable, we may, both in word and deed, carry out the things which are pleasing unto Thee.