Wednesday of the 12th Week in Ordinary Time 2025

Published: June 22, 2025

Bishop Anthony B. Taylor preached the following homily at the Cathedral of St. Andrew in Little Rock on Wednesday, June 22, 2025.

Bishop Taylor

To understand today’s Gospel about rotten trees bearing rotten fruit and good trees bearing good fruit, it helps to read this passage in the context of the immediately preceding passage about the "pearl of great price." 

You remember Jesus' parable that the kingdom of heaven is like a man searching for a fine pearl who, upon finding it, "goes and sells all that he has and buys it?" We priests spent years searching for the pearl that God has chosen for us, discerning our vocation. And upon finding it, we gave up everything to make it our own. This pearl is truly "of great price" — celibacy is costly, obedience is costly, death to self is costly, which is why it is also so valuable. 

Thieves steal what is valuable, and so Satan tries to steal our priesthood. Hence Jesus' warning: "Do not give what is holy to dogs, or throw your pearls before swine, lest they trample them underfoot, and turn and tear you to pieces." It is helpful to notice that a pearl is the product of irritation, which reminds us that faithfulness to our priesthood is not always easy. 

You know how pearls are made: a grain of sand enters the oyster when the shell’s valves are open for feeding and becomes embedded between the shell and the soft skin of the oyster. The oyster then secretes a substance that coats the irritant, forming a pearl. 

Many of us experienced a call to the priesthood that was like that: Jesus wouldn't leave us in peace — especially when our shell was open and we let down our guard. He kept tugging at our hearts. Sometimes this was irritating. But the Lord persisted and began to form a pearl within us. This process began before entering the seminary and has continued since ordination. Jesus turns every new challenge into an opportunity to make our pearl more beautiful. Even our stumbles, once we learn from them. Today we thank God for the opportunities he gives us to grow in holiness — and also for the challenges he uses to form us into the kind of priests he wants us to be. Good trees produce good fruit, as per today’s Gospel.

This experience equips us to help others search for their "pearl of great price." And also for them, it is precisely amid irritating things — the crosses they bear — that their pearl is to be found. They open their shell to us and let down their guard, sharing very private matters with us. Their trust and vulnerability are not only deeply touching, but also challenge us to serve them with a love that is ever more pure and innocent, and thus our own pearl grows more beautiful.

We priests have the honor of serving the people Jesus entrusts to our care, which is why the Church asks us to die to ourselves as a condition for ordination. That was the great price Jesus paid for us. We lay prostrate before the altar during the litany of the saints as a visible sign that through ordination we die to this world so that, like Jesus in whose priesthood we share, we might bring life to others. In baptism, we died sacramentally so that we might live. In ordination, we die sacramentally so that others might live. 

In today’s first reading, God promises Abram that despite his and Sarah’s infertility, if he put his faith in God who had called him to leave Ur of the Chaldeans, he would have descendants as numerous as the stars of heaven. In a similar way, God promises us who are celibate and put our faith in God who has called us to the priesthood that we too would have numerous descendants beyond counting, spiritual offspring as numerous as the stars of heaven.

As we gather today, let us praise the Lord for the priesthood we share, thank him for the faithfulness of our jubilarians and the blessings we have received through our priesthood and pray that the Lord will enable our pearl — the pearl of our shared priesthood — to grow ever more beautiful in the years that lie ahead.