A REFLECTION FOR SEPTUAGESIMA
Complacency
is one of the greatest dangers we encounter in our progress towards our final
end. How easy it is to just let things
go, to relax and ignore the dangers that face us and the challenges to which
God invites us to rise. As we bask today
in the comfortable satisfaction that is so alluring, suddenly the clarion call
of God’s mercy and justice sounds out!
It shatters our illusion of smug tranquility, beckoning us to respond
with every fiber of our being, that we might survive our final judgment and
reap the rewards of a Christian life well spent.
The
question we must ask ourselves today, and I repeat the word “must,” is whether we will choose to
answer God’s alarm call to action, or, as we so often do each morning, merely
hit the snooze button, and put off our responsibilities for as long as we think we can. But we should consider God’s alarm more as
the urgent wail of a tornado warning—we’d better move fast before we are swept
up in the vortex of a sinful world and the devil’s clutches. We may stand idle, but the devil doesn’t!
The
householder in today’s Gospel needs workers in his fields. It is harvest time and all those blades of
wheat, human souls every one, must be gathered for the great judgment. When we look around us at the great fruited
plains of this world, do we see wheat, or do we see weeds? One of these days, Christ will come in
judgment and will separate them, one from the other. It’s up to us to tend the wheat and make sure
it survives. Where is your wheat
this morning? Are all my children attending Mass today? Have I done all I can to convince my family
of the value of the true Mass and sacraments?
Have I learned my own faith well enough that I can teach it to
others? Am I supporting my
fellow-Catholics by supporting the Church financially so it can continue
providing the sacraments for them?
Most importantly of all, Where
do I myself stand in this gathering
of the wheat? Will I find myself with
the cockle, tied with other sinners to be burned? Or can I honestly say that I have answered
God’s call? That I am firmly resolved to
reject all sinful thoughts, words and deeds in my life? Do I truly love God with all my heart and
mind and soul and strength?
The
great glory of God’s love for us is that he gives us so many choices. Every second of every day, we have a choice
how to act and what to do. Today is the
day God is calling us to make that choice and change our lives. It’s never too late. No matter how grave the sins of our past, no
matter how deep we may be in the pits of complacency, we know we can turn back
to God today and firmly resolve to do our duty.
Come, labor on!
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