Fifth Sunday of Easter (B): The vine, the branches and the pruning

To whom am I united:
to the True Vine or to a bastard vine?

“ I am the vine and you are the branches”
John 15:1-8

With the last two Sundays of Easter time we enter the immediate preparation for the feasts of Ascension and Pentecost. These are the Sundays of farewell. The gospel of this Sunday and the next offers us excerpts from Jesus’ farewell discourse to his disciples at the Last Supper. This is his testament, before his passion and death. Why take up these texts precisely at Easter time? The Church follows the ancient tradition of reading during this time the five chapters of John relating to the Last Supper, from 13 to 17, in which Jesus presents the meaning of his ‘Passover’.

Prized vine or bastard vine?

In the prophetic tradition, God’s people are often presented as prized vine: “My beloved had a vineyard on a fertile hillside. […] He expected it to yield fine grapes: wild grapes were all it yielded. […] What more could I have done for my vineyard that I have not done? Why, when I expected it to yield fine grapes, has it yielded wild ones?” (Isaiah 5:1-7); “I had planted you as a fine vineyard, all of genuine vines; how is it that you turned into degenerate shoots of bastard vines?” (Jeremiah 2:21). God is disappointed because after the care and love for his vineyard, he expected fruit, but instead, the degenerate vine produces unripe grapes. How can we not see here the Lord’s lament over our situations of unfaithfulness?!

The Lord, however, does not abandon his vineyard and answers the psalmist’s prayer: “God of hosts, return! Look down from heaven and see and visit this vineyard.” (Psalm 80:9-17). And here is the messianic promise: “In the days to come Jacob will take root, Israel will flourish and sprout, he will fill the world with fruit.” (Isaiah 27:2-5). God’s visit and the fulfilment of his promise takes place with Jesus. He is the vine, the true faithful Israel who will offer the Father “the new wine” (John 2:10).

1. The vine, the branches and the vinegrower: our relationship with the FATHER

“I am the true vine and my Father is the vinegrower”.The Father is the vinegrower. What does he do? “If any of my branches doesn’t bear fruit, he breaks it off; and he prunes every branch that does bear fruit, that it may bear even more fruit”. Pruning is something essential for the fruitfulness of the vine and is an art, because you have to know what, where and how to cut. On the one hand, it is necessary to cut the shoots that will not bear fruit and weaken the plant. On the other, to prune the shoots that will bear fruit in order to promote their quantity and quality. This is done towards the beginning of winter. Then, when the shoots sprout, the weaker ones are removed and, later, also the leaves that do not favour the growth of the cluster.

From image to reality: God works a continuous pruning or purification in our lives. The pruning shears he uses are, first and foremost, his Word, but also the events of life, fraternal correction and even the criticism of non-believers, which is sometimes scathing and merciless. On our part, it takes permanent attention to cut off what is weakening our Christian life. Let the Father to prune us!

2. Abiding in Christ to bear fruit: our relationship with the SON

“Live in me as I live in you”. To express the union of the branches to the vine, Jesus employs the verb “remain”, a verb very dear to John. Here, in today’s passage, it appears seven times and about forty times throughout the gospel. Literally, the verb means “to dwell”, to abide, to live in. Our relationship with Christ is that of a mutual dwelling: I in Him and He in me. St Paul expresses this same reality with the expression ‘to be in Christ’, which we find countless times (164) in his letters. “It is no longer I who live, it is Christ who lives in me!” (Galatians 2:20). To abide, to dwell, to be in Christ means to be inserted in Jesus, to be guided by his Word, to have his way of thinking, feeling and acting. This is the fruit of a long process of frequentation with the Lord: “Master, where do you dwell? – Come and see!” (John 1:38).

Coming down to the concreteness of life, we must admit that, unfortunately, losing this attunement of the heart and life with Christ is not that difficult. This can happen in an almost imperceptible and surreptitious way, and then adaptation to a “worldly mentality” takes over. It takes constant attention to our thoughts, desires and interests. We must periodically make an examination of conscience to see where our heart dwells, for “where your treasure is, there your heart will be” (Matthew 6:21).

“As long as you remain in me and I in you, you bear much fruit”. “My Father is glorified when you bear much fruit: it is then that you become my disciples”. The expression “bear fruit” appears six times in the gospel passage. What is this fruit? Love! “His command is that we believe in the Name of his Son Jesus Christ and that we love one another, as he has commanded us.” (second reading). Only love will remain, when our life is subjected to the fire of truth: “The work of each one will be clearly visible: for that day will make it known, for by fire it will be made manifest, and fire will prove the quality of the work of each one.” (1 Corinthians 3:13).

Let us think well: the Lord has invested everything in our lives, taking great risks. There is like a symbiosis between the vine and the branches. Without the vine the branches wither and are burnt, but without the branches the vine remains barren. “In every moment of life, we constitute an argument for or against Jesus Christ” (French novelist René Bazin, 1853-1932). Allow Jesus, the Son, to make his home in you!

3. The sap of the vine: our relationship with the HOLY SPIRIT

It is the Spirit who is the lifeblood flowing through the vine and the branches. “Whoever keeps his commands remains in God and God in him. It is by the Spirit God has given us that we know he lives in us.” (second reading). Cultivating, nurturing our relationship with the Spirit is the indispensable condition for leading a fruitful and flourishing Christian life. Moreover, since we live in a condition of “diaspora”, in a context of growing secularism and marginalisation of faith, we can survive only if we are “filled with the consolation of the Holy Spirit.”(first reading).

For our weekly reflection

We often let so many sprouts grow that only produce foliage. We cultivate too many interests that absorb our energy and compromise the quality of the fruit. There is so much futility, triviality, ephemeral interests and duplicity that distract us from the important things! In a moment of intimacy with the Lord, let us try to discern some situation in our lives that is weakening our fruitfulness and ask for the courage to cut back or prune where we see we need to act with more determination.

Fr. Manuel João Pereira Correia mccj
Verona, April 2024

The vine, the branches and the pruning
A commentary on John 15,-18

Last Sunday Jesus used the image of a Good Shepherd, connected to the culture of cattle raising; today he chooses an image connected to the culture of vine growers. Vine growing is not a universal culture, but it is spreading quickly to many parts of the world and wine is being increasingly consumed, even if many do not know the plant itself. Anyway, I think that it is not difficult for anybody to understand the deep meaning of this allegory that Jesus is telling us today, based on the culture of Israel and many other peoples in the world.

Let us proceed then on this allegory. To have grapes and wine, we need, apart from the land itself, three essential elements:

1. The vine that carries new life

Jesus compares Himself with the vine, and  the Father with the wine grower who prunes the branches of the vine. Jesus, whose personality is rooted in the Father’s Love, gives life to new “branches”, “members of his body” (as Saint Paul says), called to bear plenty of fruit in communion with Him and with the Father.

Some people seem to think today that they can give fruit by themselves, as if they were the “autonomous” sources of life, as if the branches could grow without the vine or as if a vine could grow without a land and a grower. But the true disciples of Jesus know that without the caring Love of the Father given to us in Jesus Christ, the “vine” to which we are attached, our life becomes fruitless and it ends up in a useless fire.

Some seem to think also that the Church is little more than a social, political or humanitarian organization. But the Church is, in the first place and above all, the community of those specially related to God in Jesus Christ. Certainly, the Church is and does many things; it runs, for example, thousands of schools and hospitals and its ministry has many social economic, cultural and political effects… Certainly, but lets us not confuse the effects with the causes. The Church is, first of all, an space of faith and relationship with God the Father in Jesus Christ. If that faith disappears, all the rest will disappear sooner or later.

2. The branches that, springing up from the vine, bear fruit

Jesus says that we, his disciples and friends, are those “branches”. Saint Paul uses another expression, but the meaning is the same: We are members of his body. It is quite evident that the branches of a tree or the members of a body are nothing without the tree or the body. So to have life and bear fruit, we, the “branches”, have to avoid two dangers:

* To be broken and separated from the vine: I remember when I, as a young man, used to go with my father to the vineyard. We were very careful not to break the branches. If that happened, we knew that we have just lost part of the fruit we were so eager to receive from that vine. That is what is actually happening to us, when by unconsciousness or pride, we separate ourselves from Jesus Christ, thinking maybe that we are strong enough to do important things by ourselves. If we fall into that temptation, we become fruitless. It is essential to remain united to Jesus Christ with our love, the reading of his words, the obedience to his mandates, the communion with his disciples and the openness to his Spirit.

* To forget the pruning.  Winegrowers know very well that a vine that is not pruned becomes very soon old and fruitless. I remember a vine that we had in one of our communities: left without pruning for a few years, became fruitless and is was set for death. When we decided to prune it adequately, it began quite soon to renew itself and give good fruit. The meaning of this allegory is quite clear, if we do not prefer to look to another side: A life “abandoned”, not “pruned” becomes chaotic and fruitless. We all know how athletes and musicians, among many others, need a lot of discipline to make progress. The same happens with our life and our discipleship. We need the decision to be disciples, but, besides, we need to be pruned by the Father through prayer, Bible reading, good counselling, openness to the Spirit…

3. The fruit: the wine, that can transform a sad life into a feast banquet, like in Cana

We all wish to give fruit and to live happy and fruitful lives. But we must remember that fruits are not something artificially added to the branches of threes. Fruits do not come from the outer part, but from the inner one. I’s only the inner life of the tree that can assure the arrival of the fruit. In the same way, a disciple will give fruit, only if he or she has a rich inner life, in deep relationship with Jesus Christ, and if he or she allows himself to be constantly “pruned” and taken care of by the Father. If the disciple remains united to Jesus and the Father, He or she will give abundant fruits of goodness and generosity, peace and joy, humility and service… In short, of a new life rooted in Jesus Christ.
Fr. Antonio Villarino, MCCJ