Saturday of the Thirteenth Week in Ordinary Time

Lectionary: 382


Yes, days are coming, says the LORD, when the plowman shall overtake the reaper, and the vintager, him who sows the seed; The juice of grapes shall drip down the mountains, and all the hills shall run with it.

Amos may be the gloomiest of all the prophets but he cannot fail to give reason for hope. If God is the Lord of History, as every prophet knew, then the People of God have nothing to fear. No matter how bad the times nor grim the prospects, God will redeem his people.
The hopeful prophecy we hear today is echoed in the Gospel of Saint John 4:35-38:

Do you not say, ‘In four months the harvest will be here’? I tell you, look up and see the fields ripe for the harvest. The reaper is already receiving his payment and gathering crops for eternal life, so that the sower and reaper can rejoice together. For here the saying is verified that ‘One sows and another reaps.’ I sent you to reap what you have not worked for; others have done the work, and you are sharing the fruits of their work.

Jesus said this following his conversation with the Samaritan woman. She had gone down to the village and told everyone about her meeting with that fascinating man. "He told me everything I have done!" she said. So they set out to meet him and he watched them coming up the road. They were the first fruits of harvest. The seed was hardly planted before the crop was ripe and ready.
The Christian does not need to live in the best of times to put faith in God. In fact they seem to challenge the Christian more than the hard times.
When my back was stronger I loved to jog. In Minnesota, in the 1990's, before climate warming set in, the winters could be brutal. So I put on several layers of clothing, two hats, gloves and mittens and set out daily in sub-zero weather. After the first mile, I could pull the gloves off and carry them in my hands; the wool caps would retreat to the top of my head, no longer covering my ears. My beautiful body easily generated sufficient heat to defy the cold.
That's how it is with the Holy Spirit. In the worst of times the saints challenge oppression with their generosity, confidence and courage. Warmed from within by the Spirit they cannot surrender that Divine Presence to the invasive presence of malevolent authorities. Even when government officials, representing the Will of the People, arrest, torment and execute them, martyrs step forward to defy them.
I think especially of Saint Charles Lwanga and his Ugandan companions, boys ranging in age from nine to twenty-five. The group was arrested on a weekend when some of the teenagers had gone home to visit family. Returning, a couple of boys discovered their mates were being marched to Namugongo, the traditional site of execution. They hurried and caught up and were burned alive.
Today, the Church in the US and most of Europe is struggling through a period of prosperity, when the contempt of the world is not openly hostile. Many people are lost to the faith because there are so few overt challenges. Both the contempt of the left and the hypocrisy of the right, not to mention the betrayals within the Church, suggest to the gullible that the Church must finally disappear.
But God is still in charge. We have only to watch and wait for today's first reading to be fulfilled: 

I will bring about the restoration of my people Israel; they shall rebuild and inhabit their ruined cities, Plant vineyards and drink the wine, set out gardens and eat the fruits. I will plant them upon their own ground; never again shall they be plucked From the land I have given them, say I, the LORD, your God.