With every message, Our Heavenly Mother leads us to Jesus. With the latest one, she brings us to Jesus’ parables of the sower, the field and the darnel. Holy Scripture, nature and life teach us that what we sow, we shall reap.
We are in the role of the sower. We choose to sow good or evil. Jesus teaches us that the good seed is the Word of God. That is why one of the major messages of Our Lady is the task: to meditate on the Gospel every day.
When we pray with the Word of God, a profound renewal of the heart takes place. This is our response to the call of the Church in this time of grace in Lent, “Repent, and believe in the gospel”. Prayer of the heart is always a renewal of the mind, an encounter with God who is absolute good. Everything God has created and does is only good. Who we are with is who we become. After sincere prayer we become good, bearing the fruit of joy and oneness with God.
In prayer we get the strength to carry out what the Apostle Paul says in his Letter to Romans, “Do not conform yourselves to this age but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and pleasing and perfect“. (Romans 12:2). Our Lady tells us that darnel has seized many hearts and they have become unfruitful. So clearly and specifically did the Heavenly Mother name for us what is happening to our hearts.
The seed of darnel is very similar to wheat. Its roots become intertwined with the roots of the wheat and cannot be uprooted without uprooting the grain. The darnel is said to be the most widely known weed in Christendom. It is the best known and least understood weed, economically important and very rare in occurrence, decoratively impressive and poisonous in effect. And the greatest paradox is that it is protected by law and at the same time its elimination is legally necessary.
Where did so much darnel come from? We ask as the disturbed servants of Jesus asked in the parable of the kingdom of heaven (Matthew 13:24-30).
Where did the darnel come from in the midst of a family that strives to have Jesus in the center? Where did the darnel come from in the midst of the Church? Why is there so much of it in the world? Jesus answers us in the person of the householder, “While everyone was asleep his enemy came and sowed weeds all through the wheat, and then went off. His slaves said to him, ‘Do you want us to go and pull them up?’ He replied, ‘No, if you pull up the weeds you might uproot the wheat along with them. Let them grow together until harvest; then at harvest time I will say to the harvesters, “First collect the weeds and tie them in bundles for burning; but gather the wheat into my barn.”‘” (Matthew 13:25.28-30).
We often experience pain as we look at the world and the increasing presence of evil. We feel helpless. Jesus’ lesson is not to be distracted by the spell of evil. We are not to let it stop us from growing. On the contrary, we need to be even stronger wheat. To be faithful in real love, patient and waiting. To be focused on love. We must not be stopped in love. Let us be engaged in love! God’s love will never destroy anything. It has the last word and it will prevail.
This is what Our Lady repeats to us in her latest message, “That is why, you little children, be light, love and my outstretched hands in this world which yearns for God Who is love“. There is so much hope and a way out hidden in her words. In the midst of the poisonous tares, Our Lady never lost confidence in the power of God’s love, until the end.
In this time of grace in Lent, she invites us especially to pray at the foot of the cross. She tells us, “Do not lose hope because God loves His creatures. He desires to save you, one by one, through my coming here. I call you to the way of holiness. Pray, and in prayer you are open to God’s will “ (March 25, 2003). Through Our Lady’s light, her love and her outstretched hands, we learn to be frequent meditators on the Passion of the Lord on the Way of the Cross, abiding with her at the foot of the Cross.
Let us pray: Mary, we thank you for the way you show us at this time. Help us to pray with the heart, to be renewed in our resolutions for good. You have been focused only on love all your earthly life, even in the most difficult trials. We want so much to be like you, to be your light, your love, your outstretched hands. Form us in love, patience and expectation in specific acts of love until the end. Amen.