In today’s Gospel, Jesus hears of a request from some ‘Greeks’ – whether these were pagan Greeks or simply Greek-speaking Jews from the diaspora, Jews from beyond Palestine, we are not told. They approach the disciples of their own volition and with what is, plainly, a heartfelt and even urgent request, not a merely casual or voyeuristic desire. ‘Sir, we should like to see Jesus.’
Hearing of this request, there wells up in the human mind and heart of the Word incarnate a terrific wave of praise and thanksgiving to the Father. And the reason is that Jesus finds, prophetically, in this spontaneous desire of Greeks to see him an anticipation of the universal fruitfulness of his mission and, especially, his saving Death. He foresees the catholicity of the Church.
A grain of wheat falling to the earth and dying looks as though it has come to the end of its life-cycle. But in fact if it dies, if it turns into seed in the earth, it may yield a rich harvest. So it will be with Jesus, with no ‘may’ about it. From his Death will flow the salvation of the world.
As he speaks these prophetic words, there comes an answering recognition from the Father. As the evangelist John describes it, the bystanders heard a curious sound which could be interpreted as either the weather or a voice. But our Lord, hearing it on his inward ear as well as his outward ear, tells the Twelve it is a promise from the Father. The Father will glorify himself by glorifying the Son. Exegetes have noted that this episode in St John’s Gospel corresponds to the event of the Transfiguration of Christ in the other three.
Jesus’ prophecy, ‘When I am lifted up from the earth I shall draw all men to myself’ proved correct. From the first Easter onwards, that ‘drawing’ began to affect men and women in ever-expanding segments of the earth’s surface. And here I have only to think of the consequences in my own country. From the conversion of the Anglo-Saxons in the sixth century and following there issued in England a civilization which, historically, is Judaeo-Christian, though with Greco-Roman and Germanic aspects. The culture – above all, the moral culture – is unthinkable without the Conversion. The same could be said of most ethnicities that have entered America and given this society the strengths of civil neighborliness that it has. Historically, our moral perceptions are inextricably bound up with a sense of the fatherhood of God, the brotherhood of man, and the gift of grace to us through Jesus Christ our Lord. We could sum all that up in one simple formula: ‘the sacredness of all human life, as loved by God in his Son Jesus Christ from the cradle to the grave’.
True, our salvation does not depend on the state of the public culture. Yet the public culture can dispose us toward the receiving of salvation – or away from it. Salvation includes in its range the creation of conditions that help people to welcome its arrival. From the Wheat Grain falling to the Earth come outgrowths of the City of God among the cities of man. We must not led those shoots from the Paschal Mystery perish through our own lack of zeal.
