WE CAN KNOW THE SINCERITY OF OUR SURRENDER TO GOD BY THE FRUITS BORN IN OUR HEARTS.
Newsroom (05/03/2025 21:23, Gaudium Press) Taking the figure of the fruit born of good and bad trees, Our Lord composes a splendid image to illustrate a principle that may seem obvious to us today. However, no one before Him had the wisdom to speak it:
‘THERE IS NO GOOD TREE THAT BEARS BAD FRUIT, NOR A BAD TREE THAT BEARS GOOD FRUIT. EVERY TREE IS RECOGNISED BY ITS FRUIT. FIGS ARE NOT GATHERED FROM THORNS, NOR GRAPES FROM THORNY PLANTS’ (LK 6:43-44).
Good and bad fruit born from the heart
This example shows that there is no difference between what you are and what you do. Jesus Himself will go on to say later, criticizing the Pharisees’ wickedness in the face of His testimony: ’If I do not do the works of my Father, do not believe Me. But if I do them, though you do not believe Me, believe the works that I do’ (Jn 10:37-38). What, for example, were the works of the Pharisees? An application of the Law so relentless that it left everyone with their back arched from so much sacrifice, and no one was able to fulfil it perfectly. What were the works of Our Lord? A new doctrine, confirmed by miracles, resurrections, the casting out of demons, etc. In other words, the works made it known what they were.
The absence of figs on thorn bushes or grapes on thorny plants shows that what comes out of a tree is something definitively good or bad, because a fruit which contains poison and serves as food can never flourish at the same time. We can apply this truth to the intentions of the heart, because, although they are unseen by third parties, sooner or later they manifest themselves through our actions.
No one can pretend to be a virtuous person when they sin within themselves, because their falsehood will soon be revealed: ‘Man acts according to what he really is; although he uses some disguising artifice, his actions and words are the exact reflection of what he is in the depths of himself.’[1] For this reason, we should never want to reconcile good practices with other reprehensible ones, trying to establish a bridge between God and the devil. Just as we do not feed on thorns, we cannot assimilate bad doctrine or allow the spirit of the world into our apostolate, as some claim.
In this regard, St. Augustine teaches: ‘The doctrine of Christ, growing and developing, is mixed with good trees and bad bushes. The good preach it and the bad preach it. Observe where the fruit comes from, where that which nourishes you and that which afflicts you originate; both things are mingled in sight, but the root separates them.”[2] This infallible criterion will always show us the truth, because, as Mgr. Chautard concludes: “God must […] withhold His best blessings from the arrogant apostle in order to reserve them for the branch that humbly recognizes that it can only draw its sap from the divine trunk.”[3]
The fruit of generosity
On the other hand, we know that entry into the Kingdom of Heaven is granted to the good according to the fruits they bear. By these we will know the sincerity of our surrender to God. Since He took the initiative to love us of His own free will, pulling us out of the dust and raising us to the highest supernatural summit, the life of grace, how will we repay Him? This is the Sunday of the liturgy of generosity, of our response to God for everything He gives us.
Bearing in mind that these fruits also refer to the way we lead our neighbour along the paths of salvation, let us ask the unsurpassable intercession of Mary Most Holy to obtain from Her the grace to be transformed into disciples who give back all that we have received from God and, even more so, into children whose lives can be compared to the crystal placed in the monstrance: a mere instrument that does not prevent the faithful from contemplating Jesus the Host, but, on the contrary, reveals itself to be of all the better quality the more transparent it is.
Let us be authentic followers of Our Lord and devoted children of the Church who are committed to spreading the light received from on high throughout the world, and in this way all sorts of good fruits will emerge from within us, because ‘when men decide to co-operate with God’s grace, it is the wonders of history that are worked.’[4]
Extract, with alterations, from: CLÁ DIAS, João Scognamiglio. The unpublished Gospels: commentaries on the Sunday Gospels. Città del Vaticano-São Paulo: LEV-Instituto Lumen Sapientiæ, 2012, v. 6, p. 116-117, 121.
[1] MONLOUBOU, Louis. Reading and preaching the Gospel. Santander: Sal Terræ, 1982, p. 162.
[2] AUGUSTINE OF HIPPO. Sermo CCCXL/A, n. 10. In: Obras. Madrid: BAC, 1985, v. XXVI, p. 37.
[3] CHAUTARD, Jean-Baptiste. The soul of every apostolate. São Paulo: FTD, 1962, p. 35.
[4] CORRÊA DE OLIVEIRA, Plinio. Revolution and Counter-Revolution. 5.ed. São Paulo: Retornarei, 2002, p.132.
Compiled by Sandra Chisholm
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