Good Soil

Saturday of the Twenty-fourth Week in Ordinary Time C-2

Entrance Antiphon Cf. Sir 36:18 Give peace, O Lord, to those who wait for you, that your prophets be found true. Hear the prayers of your servant, and of your people Israel.

Collect Look upon us, O God, Creator and ruler of all things, and, that we may feel the working of your mercy, grant that we may serve you with all our heart. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God for ever and ever.

Scripture today: 1 Corinthians 15:35-37.42-49; Psalm 55; Luke 8:4-15

While a large crowd was gathering and people were coming to Jesus from town after town, he told this parable: A farmer went out to sow his seed. As he was scattering the seed, some fell along the path; it was trampled on, and the birds of the air ate it up. Some fell on rock, and when it came up, the plants withered because they had no moisture. Other seed fell among thorns, which grew up with it and choked the plants. Still other seed fell on good soil. It came up and yielded a crop, a hundred times more than was sown. When he said this, he called out, He who has ears to hear, let him hear. His disciples asked him what this parable meant. He said, The knowledge of the secrets of the kingdom of God has been given to you, but to others I speak in parables, so that, 'though seeing, they may not see; though hearing, they may not understand.' This is the meaning of the parable: The seed is the word of God. Those along the path are the ones who hear, and then the devil comes and takes away the word from their hearts, so that they may not believe and be saved. Those on the rock are the ones who receive the word with joy when they hear it, but they have no root. They believe for a while, but in the time of testing they fall away. The seed that fell among thorns stands for those who hear, but as they go on their way they are choked by life's worries, riches and pleasures, and they do not mature. But the seed on good soil stands for those with a noble and good heart, who hear the word, retain it, and by persevering produce a crop. (Luke 8:4-15)

Good Soil The English novel reached its height in the nineteenth century. There were great novelists, and minor ones. One of the minor novelists was John Henry Newman, beatified by Pope Benedict XVI in September 2010. He wrote two novels, and even though they would not be classed with the best of the century, for those who appreciate Newman’s thought as a great theologian and philosopher of faith, they are novels that attract repeated readings. The second novel, Callista, has the conversion of Callista, a pagan Greek woman in mid-third century Africa, for its theme. Callista passed from being a dissatisfied pagan to a glorious end as a Christian martyr. Callista’s journey of faith was not simply an intellectual examination of the evidence for the truth of Christ and the Church. As Newman narrates it, many factors were involved, and not least was the unfolding in her of basic instinctive perceptions prior to the acceptance of a creed. Callista had first principles that made her dissatisfied with the prevailing paganism. She attracted the love and fascination of the young Agellius, a Catholic, who was convinced that there was in her something that was leading her to Catholicism. Their religious beliefs differed, of course — for the simple reason that Callista was not a Christian. Nevertheless, as Newman writes, ‘He recurred to the pleasant imagination that Callista would certainly become a Christian, and dwelt pertinaciously upon it. He could not tell on what it was founded; he knew enough of his religion not to mean that she was too good to be a heathen; so it was to be supposed he meant that he discerned what he hoped were traces of some supernatural influence operating upon her mind. He had a perception which he could not justify by argument, that there was in Callista a promise of something higher than anything she yet was. He felt a strange sympathy with her, which certainly, unless he utterly deceived himself, was not based on anything merely natural or human — a sympathy the more remarkable from the contrariety which existed between them in matters of religious belief” (p.62, Universe Books).

The advance towards the acceptance of Christ and his teaching was not dependent simply on intellectual capacity. It was not dependent on the ability to think logically. Callista had a right disposition. Her first principles, her basic perceptions and views, were such as to lead her to the faith — granted the other helps that were also needed, such as correct instruction and the example of notable Christians such as St Cyprian. She also needed the aid of grace. But Callista was a good person, and her basic outlook rendered her open to Christian influences. Whereas the other pagan personages immediately around her — her brother Aristo, Juba the brother of Agellius, their uncle Jucundus, and say, the philosopher Polemo — were all such as to be impervious to Christian witness and to the word of Christ. I introduce these literary characters to illustrate our Lord’s point in the parable of today’s Gospel (Luke 8:4-15). Our Lord is speaking to a large crowd of people who had come to him from “each city.” He could see that many did not have it in them to receive his message, so he told a parable of the sower going out to sow his seed — and left it at that. As he later explained, he was the sower, and the seed was the word of God that he preached. In the case of many it had no effect. They did not believe. In the case of some, it bore a harvest. Was it that those who bore the harvest were more intelligent, more logical, more capable in mental attainments? No, that is not said. They were all part of the crowd. The difference in the results seems to be due to basic dispositions. In one lot of persons the word does not penetrate at all, and is left on the surface. It is spirited away from them by the devil. Another lot of persons have no root. They are superficial. Another lot have all their interests in life elsewhere: “they are choked by life's worries, riches and pleasures.” Others are indeed good soil. Callista was good soil. She struggled with elements of the Christian religion and was repelled by what she thought to be the inconstancy of Christians, but she had it in her to be a Christian. The witch Gurta sensed this, as did the Catholic, Agellius. So did St Cyprian. When the crisis of deadly persecution came, Callista, aided by grace and baptized by St Cyprian, declared herself a Christian.

The trouble is that many of our starting points are beyond our explicit awareness. Very often we do not know what our first principles are. We are borne along by our basic views, and it is not easy to change them, if change is needed. We must resort to divine grace. Agellius had the sense that Callista was being fashioned by grace, prior to her adoption of the Christian creed. Let us ask God to give us the right starting points, the right foundations, the right direction, a right heart. We need to be good soil. Let us put our shoulder to the wheel of personal sanctification, relying on grace, asking God for it, and striving every day to be faithful to it. Then the harvest will come.

(E.J.Tyler)

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