If you had faith like a grain of mustard seed, you could say to this mulberry tree, “Be uprooted and planted in the sea”, and it would obey you.
We have this saying of Our Lord in slightly different forms twice in the Gospel of St. Matthew, and also once in the Gospel of St. Mark. According to Matthew, our Lord twice says that faith will be able to move a mountain. We can tell a mountain to move from here to there, and it will move. Or, according to the second saying in Matthew, at the command of a person with faith, the mountain will be pulled up and thrown into the sea (cf. Mt 17:20; 21:21; Mk 11:23). These sayings issue in moral conclusions: “If you have faith”, says Jesus in Matthew and in Mark, “nothing will be impossible for you” or “Everything you ask for in prayer you will receive.”
What are we to make of all that?
In the context of St. Luke’s Gospel, the disciples have just heard the Lord’s words about forgiveness. Be ready to forgive even 7 times every day, he says (17:4). The disciples must have thought that a hard one. So at once they ask for an increase of their faith.
There have been all sorts of interpretations of the meaning the Lord’s response. Here is one about the mustard seed I came across recently, and like a lot. Jesus is actually not here rebuking the disciples for not having enough faith. He’s not hinting that they are never going to achieve anything much, and it will all be their own fault. On the contrary! What he is saying is simply: Give me the little you have. It doesn’t even need to be that much. But in my hands, and with my blessing, it will work great wonders. The analogy would be the 5 loaves and 2 fish the disciples presented when 5,000 hungry people needed feeding. It was enough, and even more than enough. As for the image of a mustard seed: we know that Jesus used it in speaking of the extraordinary growth of his Kingdom. From such a tiny beginning, a great shrub or tree grows up, so that all sorts of birds can nest in its branches (Mt 13:31, Lk 13:19, Mk 4:31).
But what about that mulberry tree, or according to Matthew and Mark, the movable mountain? Well, the whole history of the Catholic Church is shot through with miracles. There is abundant and irrefutable evidence for so many miracles of healing: real miracles, apparently impossible and baffling to science. There are plenty of other extraordinary events, well documented: things like like levitations, and bi-locations, and fore-tellings of the future, or a storm miraculously calmed, or food multiplied, or someone apparently snatched out from imminent danger, or information impossibly conveyed. Then there are countless instances of prayer answered in ways that may not quite qualify as miraculous, but which nevertheless seem very wonderful to people of faith. People pray, and jobs are unexpectedly found, or enemies are reconciled, or longed-for children are conceived, or wayward sinners are converted, or money is donated, or sickness is overcome, or peace of heart is given. But never once in all this long history have I ever heard of an instance of a mountain being moved, or a mulberry or any other sort of tree being uprooted, at someone’s prayer, and planted in the sea.
So Jesus must be speaking figuratively here. Not that we want in any way to undermine the strength of his image, because he certainly means us to trust that prayer will work great wonders. The Fathers of the Church liked to make the tree or the mountain an allegory. Through the active faith and intercession of the disciples, they said, the religion of Christ was transferred from the Jews, symbolised by Mount Zion, to the Gentile nations, symbolised by the Sea. Or if we make the Mountain a metaphor, we could think of it as some huge obstacle in my life: like a persistent bad habit, or temptation, or addiction; or maybe some pressing affliction, like a neighbour who hates me, or a broken relationship, or a painful malady. There Jesus is saying: pray, and your prayer will be answered: even wonderfully; even as if by miracle.
Increase our faith, say the disciples. And we with them make the same request today. Lord, deepen my prayer, we ask. Extend its reach. Help me to live with you in such a way that I’m always walking with you, always in dialogue with you, always spontaneously bringing to you all my worries and griefs and joys; always thanking and praising you; always fully confident in you.
According to today’s Collect, the main trouble with our prayer is that it generally falls short. We don’t ask for enough; we lack bold confidence; whereas God wants to give us very very big things. Of course we all know that we must pray, and with perseverance. Prayer nourishes our faith, just as our faith is the fuel that gets prayer going. If we let our prayer dry up, then our faith also will soon become attenuated, or even disappear. This unfortunately does happen. So we come here now precisely to nourish our faith, and to express our prayer. We come in obedience to the command of Jesus, to meet him, to listen to his word, to unite ourselves to his own prayer, above all in the saving sacrifice of his death.
Christian prayer, prayer made with faith, prayer united with the prayer of Jesus, is always fruitful, always good for us, always powerful before God. Sometimes of course it seems as if our prayer is not answered: we do not receive what we asked for. We recall that this happened to St. Paul himself. 3 times I asked, he says; and his prayer was not granted (2 Cor 12:8). In that case, with St. Paul and all the Saints, we say simply: I ask you for this Lord. If it be your will that I not receive it, then give me something even better: your grace; your friendship, your will. Above all what I ask for is union with you; for the gift of your Holy Spirit; and for life with you in your Kingdom for ever. Amen.