Today, the symbol of the Vine and the branches deepens the dynamic sense of movement where we, members of the Body, the branches, draw our supernatural sustenance from the main trunk of Christ the Vine. This viticultural vignette is most vividly visible when we experience in botany how a branch begins to flourish as it draws life from the trunk it is grafted onto. In this post-Easter season, our Neophytes, those recently baptised, are now grafted into His Body where they draw life from Christ through His Church.
The 1st Reading describes that life of Christ in His Church as a fearless proclamation of the Good News. We witness that in St Paul who had just been converted at Damascus. Soon he embarked on a mission of proselytisation amongst the Gentiles. Once he had drawn new life from Christ, Saul the Slayer became Paul the Preacher. He represented the early Christians arriving at a stage where the Church must now reach out into the world and the fruits of Paul’s conversion are there for all to appreciate. He travelled near and far to proclaim Christ to the cultures and societies surrounding the Mediterranean.
Coming to us, Paul’s proclamation continues through a life of good conduct and morality. We might not be able to stand at street corners to shout the Gospel but we can definitely advertise its truth through a life animated by the love of Christ and His commandments. This bring us to the 2nd Reading.
To be connected to the Vine is to live the commandments. Whoever keeps the commandments lives in God and God lives in him. On a personal plane (level), the commandment is to believe in the name of Jesus and on a communitarian level, it is to love one another as brothers and sisters. This love is not a cosy or fuzzy get-together in which we feel like a family but as the Psalmist says, our commitment to the Lord must be expressed most especially in our love for the poor. Ever since her inception, the poor, in every sense of the word, has taken centre stage in the life of the Church. In other words, we do not only proclaim the Gospel of Jesus Christ but that His life flowing to us must reach out to those who are marginalised by society.
While it is not mentioned in the Gospel today, what undergirds the connexion to the Vine is a vibrant sacramental life. In order to live a life in Christ and to strengthen that connexion, we draw the greatest nourishment for our faith and our actions notably through His Sacraments of Confession and Holy Eucharist. In other words, the life of the Vine and branches is vitally animated by a rich sacramental life.
Behind this powerful symbol of the Vine and the branches is a template for the transformation of our inner spiritual life and also the enrichment of our life in the world. If you are coming here for Mass every Sunday, you begin to realise that the task in this Cathedral is to draw your attention to the truth that the key to a permanent Gospel conversion is located in deepening one’s sacramental life.
This truth is frequently forgotten especially as we navigate the world. What should ground our relationship with society should be based on this imagery of the Vine and branches. Many of us live in our heads believing that the sheer power of our programmes and our structures holds the key to human progress and freedom. We are in a hurry to shape the world according to principles of reason and enlightenment. Science is our religion and technology is our tool.
But how do we not hate people? Look at Israel and Hamas. Or now Israel and Iran. Can we enact laws to compel people not to hate each other? Have they ever helped? How do we respect people? Are they rules to enforce regard or esteem for others? And have they ever helped?
It is a deeply ironical situation. In a world that has lost its taste for mystery and the mystical, we are trying to save God’s creation while Christ is trying to save souls. We forget that the good we intend to achieve can only be done with God’s assistance. Every human project that compels goodness always ends up being tyrannical. The greatest social engineering which forced man to rise above himself ended up with enslaving him to an ideology. Communism was that failed social project. This is where the Sacraments come in.
The Sacraments are not just things or rituals we undertake. They divinise us by making us more human. Laws can only coerce that much. Beyond enforcement and punishment meted out by laws we do not rise to nobility. Fear can only do so much. Outside the fear of punishment, we will devolve into the behaviours of the jungle. Citizens of a country with strict fines for simple infraction of the laws, when travelling here, have no problem throwing rubbish outside their moving vehicles. In order to rise above ourselves, we need Christ.
He is the Vine who imparts His divinity on us so that we become more human. We need more of God and not less of Him to be ourselves. The less present He is, the more beastly we become.
A culture and a civilisation more divinised will better reflect Christ’s humanity. The Vine and the branches remind us that changing the world does not change us. Changing us changes the world. To be able to change, Christians, apart from keeping the commandments must draw their sustenance from Christ through a life of the Sacraments. That is the surest path, a time-tested witness to the power of the Sacraments to transform the world. Just ask the saints throughout the ages. They are living proofs of the power of the Sacraments for change and greater good.
