Daily Reflections- June 27, 2012

A FRUIT DOES NOT FALL FAR FROM THE TREE

 

I have been doing counseling and therapy for a while now. I was introduced to it as a young seminary formator, just fresh from ordination. Up until now, I enjoy the side task of helping people find their way, in addition to my job as administrator of a school. In family systems-oriented therapy, counselors look not only at the intra-psychic issues of individuals, but at the family systems that may help breed or worsen such issues. And this, I can confidently say: the fruit does not fall too far from the tree.

In today’s Gospel passage, the Lord more or less says the same thing with a different twist. You can tell the tree by the fruit it bears. A good tree bears good fruit and a bad tree bears bad fruit. My grandparents, parents and many of my relatives were born farmers. Most of them had a green thumb. And they knew a good tree by the fruit it bore. All they did was either taste, smell, touch or see the fruit up close. And when it was good, they would keep the seeds and propagate them, even if they knew they no longer had time to enjoy their fruits. I remember a time in my childhood when papayas got blighted. Once juicy, luscious, sweet, humongous and delicious, they turned into insipid, small, pale and tasteless fruits that were not worth selling. The farmers just cut down the papaya trees and shifted to other crops that bore healthy fruits in plenty.

I know it sounds trite now by dint of repetition, but the thought is always valid. We are like trees. And what we produce, what we do, what we accomplish, all point to how good or how rotten a tree we are. Even good, old Forrest Gump, quoting his mother liberally, understood that “stupid is as stupid does.” Handsome is as handsome does. Forrest sure had a good mother — caring, loving and wise in her own way. For all his simplicity, Forrest became the sort of fruit that did not fall far from the tree. Fr. Chito Dimaranan, SDB

 

REFLECTION QUESTIONS: What kind of fruits do you think would fall from the tree of your life? Will they be good or bad?

 

Lord Jesus, You taught us that a good fruit falls from a good tree. Help us to become good trees.