[00:00] In the first reading today, in the Acts of the Apostles, we have this narrative from St. Luke, who wrote the Acts of the Apostles, how there was a debate on, you know, the rules of the first Christians coming into the faith, especially the Gentiles, because it was one of those things that they had, they had to confront because most of the people

[00:31] in the world were obviously not Jewish, and they would be coming into, as the years went on, coming into the Church and making up the majority of the believers, and the apostles had to contend with this question, how many of the rules and the laws and the regulations do they keep from the old law, or what they would consider not maybe even the old law,

[01:02] just the old prescriptions of a law that to them was the very foundation of their religion, and they obviously saw that our Lord fulfilled everything, and they might've had questions, "Okay, well, our Lord didn't say this exactly," so they had to reason through it, and they also had to contend with those Jews that were still trying to hold on to many of the old prescriptions of the old law that we've come to call the old law,

[01:34] as opposed to the new law, which our Lord gave, and we see that narrative played out in the reading today, and one of the main things was circumcision, because circumcision, we know, for us, was just a symbol of baptism, but back then, it was one of the main things that would distinguish you from the other nations, that was one of the requirements

[02:05] to be part of the Jewish religion, to be part of the people of God, and to begin to live under the prescriptions of the Torah, so for them, it was an essential part of everything that they had known for thousands of years, so many of them thought, "Well, of course, if you're gonna become part of the people of God, even under the new law, then that at least should be held on to,"

[02:38] but the apostles, guided by the Holy Spirit, and also what was fitting and reasonable, understood that circumcision meant nothing anymore, it was empty, it was a symbol, yes, part of the history, but it didn't impart any grace, and that the new circumcision was a circumcision of the heart the baptism which we receive imparts a real grace,

[03:12] the grace which really is the life of God, the indwelling of the Holy Trinity in our souls, so they were constantly having to make sure that the Jewish people who were converts to the Christian faith understood that it was no longer required, under the new law, they had baptism, which was the fulfillment of that symbol of circumcision, and it also brings to mind how, in the Old Testament,

[03:47] there were many problems, and what it came from was the weakness of men, there was a debate that these Jewish people had with Christians, and they were saying how they didn't believe that Jesus was truly God, that in the Old Testament it says that you're not to worship a man, not to worship idols, and the highest form of idol worship was the worship of men, or someone like as man, and we read the other day

[04:19] that St. Paul and Barnabas had to rend their garments and try to convince the pagans that they weren't the gods come down to earth, that they were just men, so it was like one of those things that the Jewish people obviously take very seriously, and they would put it into that category of the highest of blasphemies, and it is true, but they were applying that to Jesus as well,

[04:49] but it was on the Christians to prove that Jesus was truly God, and we won't get into that part of it, but one of the things after they were saying how "we don't believe this, we don't believe that, and Jesus wasn't truly God," and that can be a discussion for another day, but one of the things I'd like to highlight is that they went on to say, "No, we are the chosen people, we are the ones that were given everything by God, we have the law, and that was sufficient,

[05:21] we have the prophets," so the Torah and the prophets, "we had everything," but as they were talking, it became more and more apparent that they were missing the point, because the law for them, it should have been disposing their hearts to receive the greater thing, which was the grace of God, because even then, they could still be justified. It says that Abraham and Moses, many of the greats of the Old Testament were justified,

[05:53] they were justified by doing the will of God, by following Him and following the law, obviously, and yet, we see how many times, over and over and over again, the whole story of the economy of salvation before Jesus came was the attempted fulfilling of the law, of the basic prescriptions of the law, and the Jewish people, even under Moses,

[06:26] continued to fall, and what was one of the greatest sins that they committed that our Lord kept on bringing up to them is idolatry. The very thing that they were saying, "Oh, it's idolatry to worship a man," "Yeah, okay, that's fine, but we're talking about our Lord Jesus Christ," but at the same time, they couldn't even fulfill that themselves, so no matter how much they said that "we had the law given to us," it became even their own words become a condemnation.

[06:57] "Yeah, you were given the law, you were given the prophets to describe the law, you were given all these things, but time and time again, it's part of that general history that you could never do it." It became, the law for them became sin, in a way. It became a condemnation. It became something that was empty because they could not fulfill it. They proved that time and time again, and like our Lord cried over Jerusalem,

[07:27] He said, "How I wish to gather you all to Myself like a hen gathers her chicks, but you would not." And then we see it condensed in the life of our Lord, how obstinate they were. So before they even are able to talk about whether Jesus was God or not, they have to contend with the very things that they're saying. "We were given the law, we were the chosen people, we were blessed by God." "Yeah, you were blessed, but the law did not help you."

[08:00] The law became, in a way, a stumbling block. It became a source of actual more sin because you had more responsibility. You were given the law, you were given the prophets, so you had less excuses than all the pagan people around you. And they even mentioned, "Yeah, the salvation was to come to the Jews and through us to all the peoples." And they're talking about it as if it was something that was like a definite,

[08:30] but it never happened. Every time that they were required, they always fell away. And God compared them to adulterers. They were committing the sin of adultery, following the pagan gods around them, and our Lord compared them to those who cheat on their spouses, adulterers, because they failed to follow Him and trust in Him.

[09:02] So we see that as St. Paul talks many times in his writings, how the law became a source of condemnation and not a source of life as it should have been, or at least a source of disposition so that they would be ready to receive our Lord and the new law. And we see what happened when our Lord came. At that point, Jerusalem, I can see the people of God to that fig tree that He came upon as He was going up to Jerusalem, and He cursed the fig tree because it was not producing any fruit.

[09:34] And when they came back through that way, it had withered and the apostles marveled at it and were wondering what it could mean. And then we know what the meaning is, is that it was the people of God who did not produce good fruit, who did not produce the works and did not become the light to all the nations as they were supposed to. And they even understood that that's what they were supposed to do. And then we have the gospel today,

[10:08] in which our Lord says, "I am the true vine and My Father is the vine grower." That was true of the Old Testament as well. It was true that He was tending His vine, that He's the vine grower from the beginning, that He sent His word to the prophets. But we know in other parables where they killed all those who were sent to them when in another parable. And then finally, the vine grower,

[10:40] the owner of the vineyard said, "Well, I'll send My Son and surely they will listen to Him." But then what did they do? They ended up killing Him as well. And our Lord was using that parable to describe what He encountered with the chosen people of God, the Hebrew people. And that was not just one time, it was time and time again, until finally with Him, it was on the cross. But that's all to say

[11:11] that our Lord didn't just come to fulfill the law, He came to fulfill the law in order that He could establish a new law by which the tree would be able to produce good fruit, that we would go beyond, not just fulfilling the ability to fulfill that which wasn't fulfilled before and that it seemed like it was impossible, even though the natural law is something that was written in our hearts.

[11:42] It's written in our hearts because everyone knows not to kill. Everyone knows that stealing is wrong, especially stealing because if it happens to you, then you automatically know that it's wrong. So there's so many different things that we see that are just the baseline. And that's what sometimes us Christians forget. We know that our Lord is the true vine and we are the branches grafted in through baptism and we take on the life of the tree just as we take on the life of the Church, which is the Holy Spirit,

[12:13] the grace of God through baptism, just like the branches on the tree that are grafted in take on that life. But sometimes where we are in neglect is in the second part. Our Lord says, "He takes away every branch in Me that does not bear fruit and everyone that does bear fruit, He prunes so that it bears more fruit." That's where we have to concentrate on

[12:44] because we've been given the grace of God in baptism. We are grafted in as long as we remain in Him, meaning in the state of grace. And then if we don't, we go immediately to confession, to the sacrament of reconciliation. And also we receive Communion by which we grow and are nourished in that life of grace. But sometimes we neglect other things like for example, prayer. We neglect to go to the source

[13:15] and ask as our Lord said, "Whatever if you remain in Me and I in you and My words remain in you, ask for whatever you want and it will be done for you." "By this, My Father is glorified." Can you imagine if we think, if we read the Gospels with the logic that God wants us to read it with, we see time and time again, He wants to give us everything that we ask. But obviously I'm not gonna get into the,

[13:46] that you're not asking for millions of dollars and winning the lottery and all that type of stuff. What our Lord wants us to ask is for the good things in our life that we also know that we need in order for our salvation and that we need help in just carrying out our day-to-day lives with our responsibilities and duties as parents, teachers, as priests, religious, every vocation out there, whether it's just labors,

[14:17] we need the grace of God just to fulfill our Christian life in our situation, in our state of life that we are in. But sometimes we forget that we need pruning and part of that pruning is when we're in the state of grace is to go to our Lord to pray, to ask Him for grace, to be disposed, to offer up the sufferings and the little sacrifices

[14:47] that our Lord asks of us each day. Because if we do not, then we don't really fulfill the great command of our Lord. Our whole goal is charity, to reach that high degree of love that our Lord asks us to even forgive our enemies, to pray for those who persecute us, to truly forgive, to be mercy to others just as He was mercy to us,

[15:18] to be truly the light of the nations and the salt of the earth, to bring as many people into the Church as possible, even our separated brethren. So we have to be careful not to become, not just, maybe not to the degree that we don't bear fruit at all. Our Lord is usually talking to us about becoming the best fruit.

[15:49] There's a phenomenon that's actually real. You see, people will see a lot of crab apple trees, and especially where I'm from, you go in the woods and there's apple trees everywhere, and you don't know whether they were from the old days when they were fields and they were planting apple trees, but there's a phenomenon. Even a normal apple tree that produces good, delicious fruit, if it's not pruned, if it's not taken care of, it can produce root stock,

[16:21] meaning that the tree basically goes back to the worst possible version of itself, so that most people that pick this fruit will say, "Oh, this is a crab apple tree," but it's actually not a crab apple tree. It's a tree that's been neglected over years and years and just went wild, and even though it may taste sour and everything, it can be recovered if you do a lot of work, but for the most part, it's been neglected

[16:51] and it'll never produce good fruit again. It does produce fruit, but it's sour. It resembles a true crab apple tree, but it's not really a crab apple tree. It's actually a good apple tree that has been neglected, and then all of a sudden, the root stocks come up, and if it's not pruned, if it's not taken care of, even the seeds from the apples that fall, it will not produce the same as its parent tree.

[17:22] It won't produce its like. It has to be taken care of, the ground, the soil, everything, so we can look at that as an example of those of us who are in the state of grace that are still part of the tree, the vine, which is our Lord, but we're preventing ourselves from being pruned by God so that we bear even more fruit, so let us pray to God. Let us not fall into that obstinacy that we know that was going on in the Old Testament,

[17:54] that having blinders over us and thinking, "No, we're the people of God. We're the chosen people. We're the light to the nations. We're the ones that are blessed." "Yeah, we are, but we can all fall into that error of thinking that we're producing great fruit when really we're putting blinders on," so let us ask our Lord in the state of grace to be disposed to be pruned by the Father in order that we might bear more fruit, better fruit, and in this way, we will remain in Him,

[18:26] and His words will remain in us, and whatever we ask of our Lord shall be granted to us because in this way, the Father is glorified.