What kind of a day was it?
The Gospel Reading was Saint Matthew 7,15-20.
Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep's clothing, but underneath are ravenous wolves. By their fruits you will know them. Do people pick grapes from thorn bushes, or figs from thistles? Just so, every good tree bears good fruit, and a rotten tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a rotten tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire. So by their fruits you will know them.
The very familiar words made me think that any commentaries must sound very thin and worn out in any reflection. An experiment taught me a different lesson. I did a quick Google search on the simple words “by their fruits you will know them”. The Result displayed 133,000,000 hits.
The first three Random Results on this cue fastened on some searing issues.
1. President Bush, relegated lamentably on the fruits of his performance, according to one view.
2. President Mugabe pilloried for the criminal fruits of injustice towards the people of
3. Fr. Thomas Reese S.J., in a feature in the New York Times, takes up the opening, “Beware of false prophets”, and applies them to the fruits of popular visionaries and pilgrimages. He is a bit too cavalier in his dismissive-ness, but his orthodoxy is bracing for its sound theology of true Revelation.
Fr. Reese's premise is a clear statement.
By Their Fruits You Will Know Them
The Catholic Church approaches visionaries with a great deal of skepticism. Belief in visions or any post-apostolic revelations is not required of churchgoers. In most cases, the church actively discourages the faithful from getting involved in them.
He takes for example, the “revelations” of Anne Catherine Emmerich, used by Mel Gibson in “The Passion of the Christ,” were found to be “devout fiction or, to put it more harshly, as well-intentioned frauds” created by Clemens Brentano, a German Romantic poet. The revelations were not used by the church in judging her sanctity.
And for the summer time Pilgrimage jet-setters he has this good advice. My response to Catholics who are caught up in private revelations and apparitions is to ask them a series of questions.
• “Do you believe the Bible is God’s revelation?” They of course have to say yes. Then I ask, “Have you read it?” Sadly, the answer is usually no. “Why are you chasing after questionable revelations when you have God’s Word sitting at home?”
• “Do you believe that Jesus is present in the Blessed Sacrament?” Again, they have to say yes if they are Catholic. “Have you visited him recently?” Sadly again the answer is often no. “Why are you running around the country when you can visit Jesus in any Catholic church?”
Immediately after the Mass for the Residents at the Guesthouse the phone began to ring from the Media. The Edinburgh Evening News, following up on stories of fraud and scams perpetrated against older people took up the story of my own experience of cyber criminals on the Internet. The story has taken wings again, possibly because of the summer gap in News stories.
Local Radio was next on-line, and was happy to have a sound bite for their chat ‘Talk Talk 107’.
This was followed by a Journalist and his photographer for further coverage.
The Edinburgh Evening News article can be found on its Website.
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