Seeking the Lord’s Will

Are you part of the good seed or are you part of the weeds?  Today’s gospel reading invites us to ask ourselves if we are following God’s Will or not.  God is patient with us but there will be a final judgment.  Where do you plan to spend eternity? 

We need to ask these questions individually but we also do well to ask how we are doing communally as a people.  At the time of today’s first reading, the nation of Israel had gone astray.  Some of them thought God had abandoned them, asking, “Have you cast Judah off completely?  Is Zion loathsome to you?” when they should have been saying is, “We recognize, O LORD, our wickedness, the guilt of our fathers; that we have sinned against you.” 

This follows yesterday’s first reading where God compared his people to a rotten loincloth and described them as “good for nothing.” 

We do well as individuals and as a people to periodically ask how we are doing, examining our consciences.  Individually we are blessed with the gift of the Sacrament of Reconciliation where we can seek God’s forgiveness if, as we said in yesterday’s responsorial psalm, “you have forgotten God who gave you birth” and sinned. 

As a nation and as people seeking to answer God’s Call as His Church, we need to ask periodically if we are in need of reform.   

I think of St. Francis of Assisi who received a call to rebuild God’s Church.  God called St. Francis to help put the Church back on God’s path. 

Today, we celebrate the memorial of a Carmelite, Blessed John Soreth.  He was born in Normandy in 1394.  He joined the Carmelites, became a priest, and earned a Doctorate in Theology.  He would eventually become the Prior General of the Order.   

He was a reformer, but he was not a reformer who sought his own way.  He sought God’s Will, which is exactly what we should all be doing.  He did not force reform on the other friars.  Instead, “he encouraged them to holiness of life by their divine living of the Rule of St. Albert” (Irish Province of Carmelites, “Blessed John Soreth” https://carmelites.ie/saints/blessed-john-soreth/). 

Whatever our state in life is, whether we are a Carmelite sister, a third order member, a member of the laity, or a priest like myself, our goal should be to fulfill God’s Will for us.  We ask Blessed John Soreth for his intercession that we may all seek God’s Will in all things.