One of the great privileges of my career as a priest is the work I’ve done with the young people at Mercy Home for Boys & Girls. During my many years here, I’ve seen the lives of countless children changed by the kindness and support they received while at our Home.

At Mercy Home, we have a motto: to give our young people both roots and wings. This motto is symbolized by a tree because we want our boys and girls to have solid roots, deep in the ground, to create a firm foundation for the rest of their lives. These deep roots develop over time and with great care as we provide our children with an excellent education, a safe environment, food and clothing, spiritual and moral formation, therapeutic services, extracurricular activities, and, most importantly, compassion and love. All of these dimensions help our kids to develop a strong sense of self and the confidence to envision a brighter future. For our young people to truly succeed, their roots must go deep. And with these roots they will one day have wings to fly, and the ability to reach whatever goal they set their mind to.

In one of the Gospel passages this month, Jesus speaks of a sower sowing seed in the fields. This is an image that would be very familiar to people who lived during Jesus’s time. The seed, we are told, falls on all types of ground—rocky ground, scorched earth, and rich, fertile soil. The seed that is successful is the seed that lands on fertile soil and establishes deep roots in order to grow and produce wheat in abundance.

The invitation of this Gospel passage is for all of us to do all that we can to establish deep roots into the fertile soil of the loving heart of God. When we are in communion with the Lord and nourished by prayer, doing good for others, the sacramental life of the Church, and being a grateful person, we allow the roots of our faith to go deep and produce fruit. The Gospel tells us that when our roots go deep, we will produce a hundred- or sixty- or thirty-fold. We must realize that it is only with a firm foundation in God’s love that we are able to continue the work of God through our gifts and talents.

Roots and wings is the motto of Mercy Home, but it can easily be a motto for all of us who live our Christian faith. We must develop deep roots so that we are able to fly and bring the good news of the Gospel to others through what we say and do.

As we celebrate the Eucharist together this month, I pray we all come before the Lord with grateful hearts and a deep desire to be nourished by His word. Through this, we are able to do God’s work by being faithful to his will.