I do a lot of hiking out in the woods. I love coming across old farms and fields. I was walking a trail a few days ago and it led me through several old farm fields. I don’t know how long the fields were abandoned but what was once pasture with beautiful grass is now covered with weeds.

It makes me think of the parable of the weeds. Matthew 13:24-32 Jesus talks about the landowner planting wheat and during the night his enemy comes in and throws bad seeds in with the good. When the wheat grows so do the weeds. The servants want to pull out the weeds but the landowner says no. He is afraid they will pull out some of the wheat as well. He says they will separate it after the harvest and burn the weeds. This is the same as God will do on Judgement Day. MT 13:36-42

Another parable he put before them, saying, “The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a man who sowed good seed in his field; but while men were sleeping, his enemy came and sowed weeds among the wheat, and went away. So when the plants came up and bore grain, then the weeds appeared also.  And the servants of the householder came and said to him, ‘Sir, did you not sow good seed in your field? How then has it weeds?’ He said to them, ‘An enemy has done this.’ The servants said to him, ‘Then do you want us to go and gather them?’ But he said, ‘No; lest in gathering the weeds you root up the wheat along with them. Let both grow together until the harvest; and at harvest time I will tell the reapers, Gather the weeds first and bind them in bundles to be burned, but gather the wheat into my barn.’ ”

The Holy Bible, Revised Standard Version; Second Catholic Edition. (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2006), Mt 13:24–30.

We have let Satan in and he has placed weeds amongst the wheat. The weeds have taken over. Just like the world today the weeds have pushed the wheat away.

As Paul tells us in Romans 1:24-25

Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed for ever! Amen.

The Holy Bible. 2006. Revised Standard Version; Second Catholic Edition. San Francisco: Ignatius Press.

Isn’t this what we have done? Look around, you can see evidence of Satan everywhere. And the sad (and scary thing) is so many of us don’t even know we are being fooled. Fooled by Satan and his followers.

We need to stop this madness. We all need to work harder to get people back on track. Start with prayer. Pray for those who can’t see the light.

Stop hiding your faith. Especially if you’re Catholic. Next time you go to a restaurant say grace before the meal. Don’t hide it, don’t be ashamed, be proud. You don’t have to make a big show of it just do it.

How about going back to mass every week? How about calling your foursome and telling them you need to push back your tee time in order to go to church. It isn’t a major thing, none of these are, but others will notice and maybe they will make changes in their own lives.

Maybe they’ll turn back to God too.