16th Sunday in Ordinary Time

Since Jesus came to save all people from sin, the Church, the Body of Christ, is made up of saints and sinners.  That is one of the lessons we can learn from the parable of the wheat and the weeds.  From Judas until today's priest pedophiles, those who belong to Christ are sometimes the worst.  What is sad is when people leave Peter because of Judas. God is merciful and the final reckoning will not come until the end of time and it will be up to the Lord and His angels to take care of things.  In the meantime, we Christians struggle to be as accepting and forgiving of each other as we can be because that's the way Christ is.  The Church can be a messy, unattractive collection of people at times, but God's Spirit waits to empower each of us.

Bringing it a little closer to home, we realize that each of us is part saint and sinner.  We have beautiful days when we are in right relationship with God and everyone else.   Grace is flowing, the angels are singing, and all is well.  We smile and sigh contentedly.  God must be so pleased with us. We are doing everything just as God has asked.  Our life is a stunningly beautiful field of golden wheat.

Then, perhaps even the next day, we fall into sin, we can barely stand ourselves, and darkness overtakes our lives due to our weakness and wretchedness.  We go flying headfirst into a hole that we don't think we will ever get out of.  Fear prevails and all is lost.  The weeds of wickedness are choking whatever little wheat there may have been.

Fortunately, most of our life is lived somewhere between those two extremes.  Each new day gives us an opportunity to pray and serve the Lord and love others.  Sometimes we will succeed in doing that and sometimes, well, we won't, at all, not even a little.  But until the end of our lives, we keep trying to be good and to do good.  

What we need is to be patient with ourselves. What we need is to love ourselves, both good and bad. Why? Because that is what God does.  The Lord is patient and gives us as many chances as we need. God loves us all of us, saints and sinners.  Like a young mother or father with their child, God delights in us.

The type of weed Jesus mentions in the parable looks very much like wheat as it grows. Similarly, we really can't tell who is holy and who is sinful.  Sometimes we can't even tell which we are.  The good news is that we don't have to.  That's God's business, and God is not getting around to that until the very end.  In the meantime, God is hoping and working for the best.  We need to do the same.