Homily: Janaury 28, 2028, Catholic School Week Celebration Mass

 “But those sown on rich soil are the ones who hear the word and accept it and bear fruit thirty and sixty and a hundredfold.”

I am sorry that Bishop Joensen cannot be here to celebrate this Mass for you. He ran into me while he was searching for someone to take this Mass, so here I am. While I am no worthy replacement, I do feel honored to preside at this Mass for you, administrators, teachers, and staff of our Catholic schools.

I would like to first thank all of you for your great work in forming faithful disciples for Christ and nurturing good citizens for this country and for the world. Your work matters, and the world surely needs more educators and collaborators like you. We appreciate you and are truly grateful for all that you do.

I am from India. I have one brother and five sisters. My parents passed on some years ago. We lived in a farming village and I grew up helping on the farm every day. My parents were never really worried about my brother’s or my studies, because for us boys, even if we failed in our studies, we can always work on the farm that our parents hand over to us.

But when it came to my sisters, it is different. In India, if girls do not have a good education, their future can be very challenging, with very limited options. So my parents were very demanding with their studies, constantly encouraging them to get good grades, to find stable jobs in the future. And my sisters all did well in school.

While my brother and I were just having fun and taking it easy. Often, we were just barely passing the tests. By sixth grade, I got worse, scoring less than 10% of the total Score. I felt embarrassed and ashamed, and only then did my mummy begin to worry. My teachers gave up on me, but honestly, I gave up on them too!

Then something unexpected happened. A new nurse came to our local government clinic, and her husband Joseph came with her to our village too. He was a university professor, but he was bedridden due to an accident. My mother spoke with him and asked if he would tutor my brother and me. He agreed but refused to charge us any fee. He simply told us to give him whatever we could afford.

And the teaching began. I would walk to his house after school and learn from him. He started with Math, then Hindi, Malayalam, science and eventually all the subjects. Somehow, he seemed to believe in me. It is something I cannot understand since my results were so poor to begin with.

However, I began to enjoy our lesson time together. I got interested in the subjects, I started asking questions, I was actually enjoying studying. For the first time, learning became a joy. Slowly but surely, my test scores began to improve. I was scoring better with every test. It felt like a miracle. Sadly, my progress stalled after he and his wife left the village.

Looking back, I realized something important in my education journey: I was not bad soil. I was soil that had never been properly cultivated.

That brings us to today’s Gospel—the Parable of the Sower.

Teachers, truly, you are the sowers. Every day you scatter seeds of knowledge, discipline, faith, attitudes and virtues. You do not control the quality of the soil. You do not decide how quickly the seed grows. But without you, no seed would be sown. Without you, the soil lays barren and will not be cultivated.

Yes, there are different types of students, different types of soil, but there is always the rich soil, that could bear great fruit - thirty, sixty, and a hundredfold. Sometimes we can tell which is rich soil, sometimes we can’t.

And often, the fruits show up only many years later. I don’t think the tutor who nurtured me well has seen how the fruits of his labor is showing in my life now. But the sowing in those younger days did make a big difference. It is real.

Like the sower in the parable, you are called to be generous in sowing. Never get tired of sowing, regardless of the different kinds of soil, or when no positive results are seen.

Who knows, among your poorer students, there could be a student like how I was in the past. And he might be another father Nivin in the future.

Today we also celebrate St. Thomas Aquinas, a great teacher of the Church. He believed that faith and reason worked together. He lived only 49 years, but in those years, he dedicated his life entirely to God. He wrote roughly 8,000 – 9,000 printed pages of great teaching in the last 20 – 22 years of his life. His writings filled more than 60 large volumes, that is benefiting us and the whole church today.

Towards the end of his life, St. Thomas had a profound mystical experience to which, he said that everything he had written seemed like straw compared to what he had seen.

In another vision, the Lord asked him what reward he desired for all his work. He could have asked for anything. Thomas replied with just four words: “Non nisi Te, Domine” — “Nothing but You, Lord.” In his wisdom, he knew that nothing in this world is more valuable than having God with us.

That is the ultimate goal of Catholic education—not just good grades, not just successful careers, but hearts that desire nothing but Christ. With that, they would have everything they need.

So thank you again — for being patient sowers, faithful cultivators, and collaborators of hope. Your teaching, your befriending, your serving and supporting every aspect of their schooling has an effective impact on their growing, so go ahead and make the difference.

May the Lord sow with you, on whatever soil is found in your school, and if God wills,  may you one day, live to see the fruit of your labor—thirty, sixty, and a hundredfold.

Amen.