Hearing without understanding

Thursday, July 27, 2017
16th Week in
Ordinary Time
1st Reading: Ex 19-1-12. 9-11. 16-20 Gospel:
Matthew 13:10-17

Jesus’ disciples came to him with the question, “Why do you speak to them in parables?”
Jesus answered, “To you it has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of heaven, but not to these people. For the one who has, will be given more and he will have in abundance. But the one who does not have will be deprived of even what he has. That is why I speak to them in parables, because they look and do not see; they hear, but they do not listen or understand.

In them the words of the prophet Isaiah are fulfilled: Much as you hear, you do not understand; much as you see, you do not perceive. For the heart of this people has grown dull. Their ears hardly hear and their eyes dare not see. If they were to see with their eyes, hear with their ears and understand with their heart, they would turn back and I would heal them.

But blessed are your eyes because they see, and your ears, because they hear.
For I tell you that many prophets and upright people would have longed to see the things you see, but they did not, and to hear the things you hear, but they did not hear it.

D@iGITAL-EXPERIENCE
(Daily Gospel in the
Assimilated Life
Experience)

Of the funeral homilies I have preached in the past, the homilies harder to deliver were those preached to families I knew.  One night I was preaching to Family X about the need to reconcile so that the soul of the deceased family member could rest.  To my surprise some family members who knew I was familiar with their internal squabbles suspected that I was taking sides. They clammed up and even refused to talk to me for some time. It was so different when I preached the same theme to Family Y – a family I did not know and did not know me. Family members appreciated the message and were eventually reconciled to each other. Because they perceived me as neutral, they did not put up any defenses as I preached.

To avoid repeating what happened with Family X, I use stories and jokes that convey God’s message indirectly. I make the story so funny because I know that when people laugh they lower down their defenses, thus allowing the message to penetrate the core of their beings. Without these stories they hear me but they refuse to listen; they see the point but refuse to understand.

This experience has deepened my understanding of why Jesus used parables. Jesus preached through parables so that his hardcore message could penetrate hardened hearts.  By the time people realized they were the targets of Jesus’ scathing message, it was already too late to resist.    – (Atty.) Rev. Fr. Dan Domingo P. delos Angeles, Jr., D.M.

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