16th Sunday - Weeds with Wheat

 

“The harvest is the end of the age, and the harvesters are angels.”

Our Lord taught the parable of the wheat and weeds to explain what the final judgment will be like. He wanted us to know that we have an enemy who wants to ruin our judgment by sowing weeds. The wheat is the true teachings, and are those who attempt to follow the way of the Lord. The weeds represent false doctrine, sown by the devil and those who follow the way of the devil. The devil wants to ruin the harvest, so the children of God do not inherit the kingdom of God.

“The kingdom of heaven may be likened to a man who sowed good seed in his field.” The world is a field, where God is continually sowing the seeds of His grace. This divine seed takes root in the soul, and produces fruits of holiness. God has prepared us like soil, and bestowed upon us His saving doctrine.

“The weeds are the children of the evil one, and the enemy who sows them is the devil.”

While men are sleeping, the enemy, who is the devil came and sowed weeds among the wheat, and then went away. The weeds sown in the midst of the wheat is called cockle-seed.

Cockle is a plant that is often found in crops in the Middle East. It resembles wheat so closely that even an experienced farmer can’t tell the two plants apart until the stalks begin to mature. Cockle is toxic to humans. If this kind of weed is mixed with flour it will ruin the bread.

The Fathers of the Church understood the weeds of cockle, to be a metaphor for false doctrine, not easy to distinguish from the truth. The devil mixes falsehood with the truth causing error. And if allowed to continue, it always has catastrophic affects in people’s lives.

The devil is extremely intelligent and very clever. He mixes false doctrines with true doctrine knowing it will cause people to be confused and doubt true doctrine given to us by the Church.

I would like to give you some examples of how the devil attempts to confuse people with false doctrine mixed with true doctrine.

Some years back ABC News Night Line aired a program about the Blessed Virgin Mary. Within the program they expressed some true teachings. For example, the program said Catholics believe Mary is the Mother of God. But they interviewed a non-Catholic from the Holy Land, who casts a shadow on the teachings of the Church on Mary. The person, who was a supposed expert, planted weeds of doubt to those who watched the program. He made it sound like Mary wasn’t a perpetual virgin and wasn’t assumed into heaven. Yet, the program explained (the wheat)—that Catholics pray to Mary and seek Her motherly intercession. There was good mixed with false teachings. There were lies mixed with truth—this comes from the devil.

Here are some other examples with regard to morality.

For example contraception. It is true parents should limit children for serious reasons and not be forced to live in poverty. It is also true without spacing children, couples won’t have the living standard they desire. But, God provides Natural Family Planning to space children. It’s morally acceptable. 99% effective. Although it may be true, the family will not have the standard of living they desire, God will provide all that is needed. The family learns to love and sacrifice for each other, and will follow God’s plan for marriage.

Abortion (It is true women have a right to choose how to live their life). But no one has a right to kill an innocent human being, especially their own child.

Cohabitation (It is true, when a couple lived together before marriage, they can save money, and learn more about each other). But we don’t try people out like used cars. When living together without a permanent commitment, it opens the door to unfaithfulness. To live together in love, means to live together avoiding sin. Sin is the opposite of love. Having relations before marriage causes each to mutually seriously harm each other’s soul.

Homosexual marriage. (It is true everyone has a right to marry whoever they want, and it’s good to live with someone you love and care about). However, God is the author of marriage, who declared marriage is only between a man and woman. Homosexual marriage is unnatural. Perverse actions are not loving, but harm the souls and bodies of each other. All sexual activity outside of marriage is seriously sinful.

Euthanasia. (It is true, that it is compassionate to alleviate and minimize suffering). But to avoid suffering at the expense of disrespecting the dignity of human life, by suicide or murder, breaks the commandment of “Thou shall not kill.” God is the author of life, and only He has the right and authority to take it.

There is direct and indirect euthanasia. Direct euthanasia is an action taken for the purpose of hastening death. These measures may include lethal injection, poisoning, and suffocation. There is also passive euthanasia, when an action is withheld for the purpose of hastening death. These measures would include the withholding or withdrawal of non-heroic measures, to include food, hydration, and oxygen. Death should not be hastened to alleviate the suffering of the family.

Whereas, natural death means to allow a person to die in comfort and peace by withholding aggressive treatment that would only cause pain and lengthen the person's lifespan by a very modest or insignificant amount. But yet provides food, hydration and oxygen when its beneficial to the dying person.

Transgenderism (It’s true we should be able to choose how to live our life). But, we do not have the right to change our God given gender. The truth is the Church recognizes every human person is created in the image and likeness of God, male or female (Gen. 1:26-27). And so we should help people discover their true identities as children of God, not support them in the disordered attempt to reject their undeniable biological identity.

There are many false doctrines which the devil sows within the Church. In Austria for example, a group of 250 priests launched an outright rebellion against the Church. They are openly rejecting the doctrine, discipline and practice which are at the heart of the Catholic Christian faith. They are seeking to lead others to join them in their errors. 

This group of openly dissident priests has gone public with their rebellion launching a website listing their points of dissent in a document entitled "A Call to Disobedience". Some members of the dissenting group say: -  to pray for Church reform at every liturgy, since "in the presence of God there is freedom of speech". - not to deny the Holy Eucharist to "believers of good will," including non-Catholic Christians and those who have remarried outside the Church. - to "ignore" canonical norms that restrict the preaching of the homily to clergy, so that lay people can preach during Mass,-- to "use every opportunity to speak out openly in favor of the admission of the married to the priesthood and of ordaining women to the priesthood."

The Argentinean Bishops stated people who are divorced and remarried civilly, and not attempting to live chastely, can receive Holy Communion. The German bishops voted in favor of giving blessings to same-sex couples. But this is contrary to Church teaching.

There are some who say God wills the diversity of religions, which means that God wills there be Muslim, Hindu, Jewish, Catholic, Lutherans, Methodists, Baptist etc.. religions as though one is not any better than another. But this idea contradicts what Catholics have long believed, that Jesus founded only one Church, the Catholic Church, and God wills all to come to know the truth found in the Catholic Church. The truth is many religions have some truths revealed by God, but only the Catholic Church has ALL divinely revealed truths.

“Just as weeds are collected and burned up with fire, so will it be at the end of the age.” Jesus gave the parable of the wheat and weeds as an example of the Last Judgment, when Our Lord will come to judge the world at the end of time. He will separate the good from the wicked. Those who have sown weeds (false doctrine) will be harvested and burned, which represents souls who will go to hell. But those who have held fast to the teachings of the Church—will be like the wheat, when they are harvested they will be taken up into heaven.

Whatever the Catholic Church teaches, we trust will help us to get to heaven. The Church is sort of like the land. Her teachings are like the wheat, which once harvested will provide food to help sustain us on our journey toward heaven. The devil attempts to mix weeds in the midst of the wheat. The weeds that he sows-- appear to be wheat and grows like wheat, but in fact are weeds. These weeds, which the devil sows, are toxic and deadly and will cause those who eat it to die, by losing one’s salvation. The devil is the enemy of the Church and our enemy. He hates us and wants to kill and destroy our souls, so we will go to hell and be lost forever.

Jesus wants everyone to be with Him in heaven. He wants to help us in our struggles of life. He wants to be part of our decisions and to walk with us. Jesus is God and can do anything for us. We pray that all Catholics will to turn to Him, to trust Him and to love Him enough to follow the true teachings of His Church. We turn to His Mother Mary as we pray:

“O Blessed Mother, Mother of God, Perpetual Virgin, You who were Assumed body and soul into heaven. Grant all Catholics and especially priests, the grace to follow Jesus, Your Son, and His Church’s teachings. As you are our Mother, so the Church is our Mother. She wants to guard and protect Her children against the weeds of the devil. When it comes harvest time, at the Last Judgment, which may come sooner than we think, may all of us be counted among the righteous, who will shine like the sun in the kingdom of the Father. Amen.”