Daily Catholic Lectio. Tue, 29 October ’24. Great is the mystery!

Daily Catholic Lectio

Tue, 29 October ‘24

Tuesday of the XXX Week of the Year

Ephesians 5:21-33. Luke 13:18-21

Great is the mystery!

The parables of Jesus concerning the kingdom of God surprise us. They are intelligible even to the common people. In today’s gospel reading, Jesus compares the kingdom of God to a grain of mustard seed and leaven.

What is the kingdom of God? Often, we equate kingdom of God with the Church, values, or life after death. But the kingdom of God simply means Jesus. That’s why Jesus tells his audience, ‘The kingdom of God is amidst you’ (cf. Lk 17:21). The world is the working space of the kingdom of God.

(a) Mustard seed

The Jews considered the mustard seed to be the smallest of all seeds (cf. Mt 13:31-33, Mk 4:30-32). When Jesus talks about ‘faith in the size of a mustard seed’ (cf. Lk 17:6), he refers to its insignificant size. Mustard seed is a seed that is obtained from the plant ‘sinapis nigra.’ This plant grows from four feet to fifteen feet. That’s why this is called a tree. Though Jesus talks about the growth of the tree, what he insists on is its insignificant origin and its enormous growth. Humble beginning, but a great ending.

Jesus yet uses another expression: “The birds of the air made nests in its branches.” In Jesus’ parable of the sower, ‘birds of the air’ are the enemies of the seed (cf. Lk 8:5, 12). But they are the plant’s friends and guests. The tree of the kingdom of God is not a ‘cell phone tower’ that casts the birds away, but a mustard tree that accommodates and feeds the birds. In the Patristic interpretation, ‘birds’ refer to the Gentiles who are converted to join the kingdom of God (cf. Dan 4:12, 21, Ps 104:13, Eze 17:23).

(b) Leaven

Leaven is the yeast that we mix with the dough for baking a cake; leaven is added to the dough to ferment it and make it soft and morbid. Yeast continues to work on the dough. Small beginning, but a big impact. Yeast does its work even when no one notices it. The work of the leaven is unstoppable, inseparable, and irreversible.

Yeast or leaven is used in the Bible in a negative way as well (cf. Lk 12:1, 1 Cor 5:6-8, Gal 5:9). But, here it is in a positive light.

What do these parables tell us about the kingdom of God?

Though a grain of mustard seed and leaven are small in size and insignificant in quantity, they have in them the potential to create great impacts. Their work is unseen. Thus is the kingdom of God. The work of the mustard seed and leaven can’t be stopped by external agencies; in the same way, the work of the kingdom can never be stopped from outside. Mustard seed and leaven create utility values. The kingdom of God creates life values in the world.

In the first reading, Paul, through that which is seen – that is, marriage bond – takes his audience to that which is not seen – that is, the nature of God’s relationship. Paul concludes that the mystery is great. Mystery is not that which is incomprehensible, but that where we form key part.

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The ‘pilgrims of hope’ are effective agents of change. (Jubilee 2025 AD, bite 237)

Fr. Yesu Karunanidhi

Archdiocese of Madurai

Missionary of Mercy