Matthew 13:10-17 for Thursday
of the Sixteenth Week in Ordinary Time
In saying why he
spoke to the crowds in parables Christ told of those who shall indeed hear but not understand, and who shall
indeed look but never see.
Christ would
rather that they hear, see
and that they understand with their hearts.
For the Biblical
Hebrew, the heart is the home of all feeling, thinking and willing— the whole
of the interior life.
Some who heard
Christ had shut their feelings, thoughts and wills to what his parables held
and offered.
St. Benedict wrote
that our feeling, thinking and willing hearts must be schooled and learn to
stay open, so that we may always hear and understand, look and see, not only
now but also in the life to come.
St. Benedict
called the school of the Lord’s service a school for the heart.
Listen carefully to the master’s instructions,
and attend to them with the ear of your heart.
Let us open our eyes to the light that comes from God,
and our ears to the voice from heaven
that every day calls out this charge:
“If today you hear his voice,
harden not your hearts.”
St. Benedict said
the road leading to salvation is bound to be narrow at the outset.
But he promised
that as we progress in a holy way of life and in faith, we shall run on the
path of God’s commandments, with our hearts OVERFLOWING
with the unspeakable delight of love.
We have a living,
life-giving parable of a heart OVERFLOWING
in the Eucharistic Body and Blood of Christ.
In the sacramental
parable of the altar our eyes look upon bread and wine.
But faith lets us see and understand
that the Lord’s Body and Blood are really present— given up and poured out, overflowing with the unspeakable delight of love
for his Father and for us.
Christ makes
himself into our communion and our share in the life to come.
He blesses us in
giving his Eucharistic Body and Blood.
Amen, I say to you, many prophets and righteous people longed to
see what you see but did not see it, and to hear what you hear but did not hear
it.
In the Eucharistic
Body and Blood of Christ, blessed are your
eyes, because they see, and your ears, because they hear.
We see, hear, eat
and drink the new and eternal covenant ... for the
forgiveness of sins, as we hear Christ say at every Mass.
And so his
Eucharist challenges his disciples, just as his parables challenged the crowd: that
they understand with their hearts and be converted and I
heal them.
Turn. Love.
Repeat.
