HOMILY for July 9, 2017: 14th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Cycle A

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14^th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Cycle A

Aisling Retreat House

Manchester, Maryland

July 9, 2017

Of Yokes and Ploughing

By (Rev. Msgr.) Nicholas P. Amato

The Amish and Jesus

The Amish farms in York and Lancaster Counties in Pennsylvania often present a warm and pastoral picture for us.

The Amish farmers work their fields with horses.  Since there is no use of combustion engines, you’ll never see any John Deere farm equipment.

Instead, you’ll find two horses pulling a plough.  In Jesus’ day, it was very much the same.

However, they used oxen to plough the fields, not horses.  And the oxen were yoked, that is, two were bound together at their shoulders by something called a yoke – spelled Y-O-K-E. 

The double yoke was a wooden collar that fit around the necks of both oxen and connected them to the plough.  The yoke had to be made carefully so that it would fit the oxen just right and not hurt or create bruises. 

If the yoke fit well and was comfortable, the oxen could go on ploughing for hours, but if it did not fit well, it would dig into the animals keep them from working.

Obviously, it would sap their strength and they would diminish their ploughing time.  This then, is the image that Jesus has in mind in today’s gospel.   

“My yoke is easy”

Jesus says, “My yoke is easy and my burden is light.”

So I am thinking: how can the yoke of Jesus be easy?  Can we really say that living the way he calls us to live is easy?

Practically speaking, (1) Is it easy to love our enemies and to turn the other cheek?  (2) Is it easy to forgive seventy times seven times, and (3) Is it easy to share what we have with people who are in need and whom we do not even know?

And add to that, Jesus makes it clear that following him means taking up our cross?  So it seems to me to be a bit of a stretch to him to say that, “My yoke is easy?”

Why Is It Easy?

Maybe the best way to evaluate how difficult or easy it is to live the way of Jesus is to compare his style of living with other styles of living.

For example, (1) Do we really think that a dog-eat-dog approach to life is easier on our nerves than working together and caring for the well-being of everyone?  (2) Are we better off emotionally by holding on to our resentment rather than forgiving?

Again, (3) Is war really more beneficial than diplomacy and compromise – an important point to think about right now with North Korea?  (4) Is it easier to fall asleep at night trusting in the stock market rather than trusting in God’s providence in our lives?

Again, (5) Do we feel inner peace by going along with whatever looks like fun or by sticking to what we believe is morally right?  (6) Does it make me feel better about myself when I look down upon others I live or work with and judge them as less or when I refrain from judgment and instead put myself in their skin and life situation? 

(7) Does racial, religious, or gender prejudice expand me as a person, or am I bigger as a person when I am open and try to understand and include?  And finally, (8) Is it really easier to live with myself when I don’t tell the truth or when I truthfully own up to what I did or did not do?

Conclusion

Jesus assures us today that his “yoke is easy” and his “burden is light.”

He is gently, but clearly calling us to try his way of living.  And if we do, we just might find that it contributes more to our happiness in the long run and is even lighter in the short run of living.