October 6, 2025
Paulist Fr. Rich Andre preached this homily on the 27th Sunday in Ordinary Time (Year C) on October 5, 2025 at Old St. Mary’s Catholic Church in Chicago, IL. The homily is based on the day’s readings: Habakkuk 1:2–3; 2:2–4; Psalm 95; 2 Timothy 1:6–8, 13–14; and Luke 17:5–10.
Our first reading today comes from the prophet Habukkuk. He dares to ask God some hard questions as the Babylonians bear down on the weak nation of Judah: “Why are you letting this terrible stuff happen to us?” God responds to Habukkuk, “Have patience; I will fulfill my promise.”
We can argue that our other readings today address a much more common occurrence in the life of faith: we ask questions of God, but we can’t immediately determine how—or if—God responds. Jesus calls us to a more mature relationship with God, a relationship built on faith and trust.
Even when God seems to be silent, we can still recall that God has graced us with mercy at every moment of our lives.
In the verses just before today’s passage, Jesus told the disciples that if someone wronged them seven times in one day and that person asked for forgiveness seven times, they were supposed to forgive the transgressor seven times. No wonder the apostles asked Jesus to increase their faith!
Today, Jesus uses two different analogies to speak about faith. The first analogy speaks of seeds and trees; the second speaks of masters and servants.
Thirteen years ago, as a new priest living in Knoxville, TN, where the summers outside feel like a greenhouse, I came to appreciate Jesus’ vegetative analogies in new ways. Decades ago, the Paulist Fathers had such a beautiful garden in Knoxville that our neighbors used to wander through the backyard to admire it. But by the time I arrived there, the garden had fallen upon hard times. The garden had probably reached its nadir when a large tree came crashing down in a hail storm the previous year.
In my first year in Knoxville, I tried to restore the garden. By far, the largest tree in the garden was the mulberry tree. It was humongous, providing shade for a huge swath of our yard. When Jesus says that faith the size of a mustard seed could uproot such a tree, I shake my head in awe… even though I’m not always I understand why uprooting a tree would be something that Jesus would encourage.
[Pause.] Now, we need to try to address the second half of the gospel passage about the master who asks the servants to do task after task without rest.
[Pause.] If God is the master and we are the servants, why do we do what the master asks of us? Is it because we fear that we’ll be punished if we don’t do as we’re told? Or do we do what God asks of us because we know that it’s necessary for our salvation? In other words, are we motivated by consequences imposed on us if we don’t do the work, or are we motivated by the consequences that naturally happen by us completing the work? As we grow in relationship with God, I hope we can move away from being primarily motivated by the threat of hellfire, towards being motivated by the good things that await the people who carry out God’s will!
Of course, I hope to reach a point in my relationship with God when I’m never motivated by either threats or benefits. I dream of being motivated to do God’s will solely because of my love for Jesus Christ. My motivation shouldn’t be based on God’s judgment. It should be based on God’s love for me! Such a relationship requires me to trust in God, whether or not I understand why God is asking me to do certain things.
The more we trust God, the more God will ask of us. Just read the lives of the saints for proof of this! There’s a part of me that doesn’t want God to ever push me outside of my comfort zone. “I showed you that I could trust you before,” I’ve sometimes prayed to God. “Why do I have to show you again?” The next time God invites me to push myself beyond my limits, I hope that I’ll be able to sincerely pray the beginning of this beautiful-but-challenging prayer of Charles de Foucauld:
Father, I abandon myself into your hands; do with me what you will.
Whatever you may do, I thank you: I am ready for all, I accept all.
Let only your will be done in me, and in all your creatures.
[Pause.] When the time comes, will I have sufficiently grown in my relationship with God to trust God completely? Will I have faith sufficient to uproot a mulberry tree?
[Pause.] Maybe uprooting a mulberry tree isn’t as daunting a task as it sounds. You see, until 2011, there were two large trees in our backyard in Knoxville, and they were both mulberry trees. When the hailstorm uprooted one of our mulberry trees, it completely transformed the landscape. In the subsequent years, as I admired the garden from my bedroom window, I realized that if that mulberry tree hadn’t fallen, there probably wouldn’t have been as much life in our backyard: the sunlit open spaces, the colorful blooms, the flitting birds and butterflies. The mulberry tree had proven to me, once again, that after every death, there is a resurrection.