Today’s question is for women. It’s a question about nostalgia, Christian nostalgia. And the question is this: How many of you once owned a mustard seed necklace or bracelet? Do you recall those small, hard seeds encased in those glass marbles? If you remember this bit of jewelry, only then can you appreciate the small size of a mustard seed. I mean: if I talk about mustard, most of the kids would think of that yellow stuff you put on hot-dogs and hamburgers. I assure you, if you try to plant a squirt of mustard in the ground when you get home, you will not grow a mustard tree!
No, there really are mustard seeds and they really are very tiny. I could say they are no bigger than a pin-head, but what with the scarcity of home-made clothes, perhaps, straight pins are as uncommon as mustard seeds. Anyway, believe me when I say a mustard seed is really, really small.
Believe me. Actually, this is what today’s homily is all about. Not about believing me, necessarily, but rather about your belief in God, in God’s incarnated son, in their love for one another and for us. Today’s reflection is about belief and about faith.
However, if you want a more commercial view of belief and faith, I have a special sign1 for you today. It’s this! “Believe it” Although I might have given a homily today on the parable of how the kingdom of God is like a Rocket’s game, I’ll leave that one up to Father Brendan. Instead, I want to talk about today’s scripture readings – and especially about mustard seeds.
Mustard seeds are mentioned in the gospels of Matthew and of Luke as well as in the reading we heard, today, from Marks’s gospel. Matthew and Luke very clearly relate faith with mustard seeds, and how, even if our faith is no larger than a mustard seed, we could move mountains. (On second thought, maybe I am talking about the Rockets. After all, I am talking about “faith.”)
So what is faith? What is this power we have to move mountains? First of all, faith is not a thing. “Things” can be measured and weighed. They can be seen, felt, and sometimes heard. Recently, physical scientists have rejoiced because, with the restored Hubbel telescope, they have been able to see a so-called “black hole”. At the other end of the physical scale, other scientists have seen evidence of the final “quark,” one of the so called building blocks of matter. Now, they no longer merely believe black holes and quarks exist, now they “know” they exist. For many people, seeing is believing. For others, even this is not enough. In order to believe, they must understand every step of the process. They must answer every question about how something works in order to believe it exists.
Yet, we do not understand how the greatest power in the universe works. It cannot be weighed nor measured by any instrument we can construct. How do we know love exists between a husband and wife, love between parents and children, love between two friends, love between God and us? There is no way to measure love, not even a way to confine it. Yet, we know love exists – or when it does not exist. We, each, have faith that it exists – or a lack of faith believing it does not exist.
Faith about human love and about divine love can start out to be very small, as small as a mustard seed. However, it is a faith which can grow to an unexpected size. And in the process, it can yield shelter and safety for others, just as the mature mustard tree provides shade and shelter for the birds of the air.
Faith is knowing something completely without seeing it, without hearing it, without touching it. Faith grows even without our knowing how it grows. The ancients knew nothing about photosynthesis or plant metabolism, about how roots grow, and cells divide. However, these are topics which most school kids know more about than did the greatest sages of the time of Christ. But those ancient people did know that from the seed, comes new life. They knew good soil is essential for this new life. They knew that, with patience and tender care, the blade and the stalk produced leaves and flowers. With the warmth of the sun, the flowers produced seeds. They knew the seeds could be harvested and used for the good of humanity. Exactly how this happened, they did not know. Except to have faith that God would provide the harvest.
And so it was that Jesus described faith in the coming Kingdom of God. A seed which grows in a mysterious, unknown way and becomes a source of nourishment for all who seek to harvest it. The Kingdom of God begins in a small way, yet when mature, provides comfort to all those who seek it out.
A writer by the name of Dick Westley has made a comparison of religion and faith. He says “religion” can be described with these words: “Fear not, trust in God and He will see to it that none of the things you are afraid of will happen to you.” He then goes on to say how “faith” may be described by these words: “Fear not, the things you are afraid of are most likely going to happen to you, but they are not really the sorts of things that believers ought to be afraid of, and [they] have very little significance compared to transforming the world into the Kingdom.” So, “religion” says: fear not. God won’t let bad things happen. While “faith” says: fear not. Bad things may happen, but they’re not important in the Reign of God.
If Dick Westley’s definition of religion and faith are accepted, several consequences follow. First of all, it’s possible to have a pagan “religion.” On the other hand, there can never be a pagan “faith.” And second, it’s, also, possible to have a Christian “religion” but be devoid of Christian “faith.”
With “religion,” we attempt to force God to do our will. With “faith,” we try to do what God wills for us, knowing God, our Father, loves us and wills only the good for us no matter how the events of our life may be perceived by our human, external sight.
Some two thousand years ago, Saint Paul wrote a letter to those Christians living in Corinth. In this letter he reminded them: “We walk by faith, not by sight.” We may not, at times, recognize what surrounds us, but we know where we are heading. We may stumble and momentarily be turned aside, but we know with confidence we are heading home towards God, the Father, who will welcome us with open arms. Along the way, we are guided by the words of Jesus the Christ.
In today’s gospel reading, we were reminded how he spoke publicly to the crowds in parables, in puzzling stories filled with paradoxes. But to his friends, to his disciples, he explained these things privately. So, it is with us, who are his present-day disciples. With our ears we hear the words proclaimed about him. But in our times of prayer with him, we learn in our hearts what his love means for each one of us. It is then, in prayer with him that we, indeed, “walk by faith and not by sight.” Let us now continue our journey with Jesus the Christ as, together, we transform the world into his Kingdom.
Eleventh Sunday in Ordinary Time; June 12, 1994
Ezl 17:22-24; 2 Cor 5:6-10; Mk 4:26-34
1 The accompanying red on yellow sign I held up had these words: “Believe It” and the subtitle “Chronicle Sports.” The sign was in the Sunday newspaper in support of the (then) champions Houston Rockets.