Fr. Roger J. Landry

Visitation Convent of the Sisters of Life, Manhattan

Wednesday of the Seventeenth Week in Ordinary Time, Year I

Memorial of Blessed Stanley Rother

July 28, 2021

Ex 34:29-35, Ps 99, Mt 13:44-46

 

To listen to an audio recording of this homily, please click below: 

https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/catholicpreaching/7.28.21_Homily_1.mp3

 

The following points were attempted in the homily: 

* Today we have two short parables that summarize the essence of the Christian life, pointing, however, to a reality that too few actually realize and live. They indicate the fundamental Christian choice and the joy with which we’re supposed to make and renew it. The parables are simple enough to understand. The first is of a poor peasant who happens to find a buried treasure in the midst of his work in someone else’s field. There were no real banks to speak of in ancient Palestine. People would often bury things of value in secret locations in fields. There was no sense of “finders keepers, losers weepers” then; whatever was discovered in a field belonged not to the discoverer but the owner. That’s why the man needed to buy the field. It’s quite obvious that the one selling had no idea that an ancient treasure was buried on his property. He didn’t place the same value in the field as much as his peasant did and so he sold it. For the peasant, selling all he had in order to get the money to buy the field was nothing compared to what he knew he would be gaining. The second parable is of a wealthy merchant actively searching for precious pearls, going from place to place in pursuit of something truly valuable and beautiful. Finally he found the pearl of his dreams, whose worth was unsurpassable, but whose owner valued it less than the money and property he would get in exchange. And so the wealthy merchant sold all that he had before, doubtless houses, gems and other valuables, to obtain that pearl of great price.

* We see a few fundamental lessons about the kingdom of God in these parables.

* The first is that the Kingdom is a treasure greater than any other. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus told us, “Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also” (Mt 6:21). He told us in that same Sermon that many of us seek to “store up for [ourselves] treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal,” but he wanted us to “store up for [ourselves] treasures in heaven,” a treasure not measured in clothing that moths can wreck, metals that rust can corrode, or money that thieves or taxes can take. Jesus is telling us that our heart must be set on God, and not just in general, but set on him more than an aging professional athlete wants to win a championship, more than an ambitious politician seeks to win high office, and more than a man in love will do everything he can to win over and marry the woman he can’t stop thinking about. Is our heart set that way? Do we really treasure God?

* The second lesson is that to obtain the treasure isn’t cheap. We have to give up things, and not just things that we don’t want or value, but things that are precious. In the parables, each sells all he has, all his valuables. Jesus says that to enter his kingdom, we must deny ourselves, pick up our Cross, lose our life, sell what we have and give to the poor, love our enemies, give our cloak and not just our tunic, and even be willing to leave father and mother, children and lands, for his sake and the sake of the Gospel. The price is steep! But it’s nothing compared to what we’re getting.

* That leads to the third lesson. Despite the cost, it’s still the greatest bargain of our life. It’s like trading in a small house in a crowded, unsafe neighborhood for a Mansion at the bay,