The Living Spirit and the Liturgical Calendar

“Here is an image, Jesus said, of the kingdom of heaven. There was a man who sowed his field with clean seed …” (Matthew 13:24). The countryman is not impatient because the season of flowers and fruit is swiftly over and the winter is so long. He is as conscious of life in winter, when the crust of the earth is iron and not a leaf is on the hedges, as he is when the fields are green and the bough is white. He has lived through cruel winters and heard old wives moaning full of foreboding for the spring; he knows that with spring the snowdrop comes again, and the pale drift of crocus and the delicate green blade of his early wheat. He knows that the life sleeping in the earth is stronger than anything that can assail it, that the life that is in all living is stronger than death. That is the knowledge which is the root of his peace. The mystery of the seed is his. Scattered on the wind, it is not lost, but carries life wherever the wind blows. It sows the meadows and the woods. It sows the cleft in the rock. It sows the roadside and the ditch. It sows the dust-heaps in the cities. Buried, it springs from the grave, a green herb of life. It is the symbol of Christ and the Kingdom of Heaven. CARYLL HOUSELANDER FROM THE PASSION OF THE INFANT CHRIST (ANGELICO PRESS, 2025)

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