The familiar teaching of Jesus about “the vine and the branches” (John 15, 1-8) is taken from the Last Supper discourse. Jesus uses an Old Testament image of the vine and branches, very familiar to His disciples, to help them understand the closeness of their relationship with Him and the necessity of their maintaining it. Their relationship is not simply “teacher and students” or “rabbi and disciples.” He is telling them, at the Last Supper no less, that His life and their lives are mutually dependent – as close as a vine and its branches. In fact, in using this image, Jesus is explaining to them [and to us] what our relationship with Him could (and should) become.
St. John, in his First Letter (3, 18-24), tries gently to prod us into full discipleship. He says, “My children, our love is not to be just words or mere talk, but something real and active.” Do we appreciate that mere “membership” in the Church is not the same as full discipleship? Bishop Fulton Sheen used to say, “You won’t meet Christ in your Sunday Mass, if you haven’t rubbed shoulders with Him in the office, in the factory or in the kitchen. You won’t hear his message from the altar, if you were deaf to his call at home.” Jesus put it simply and bluntly: “It is to the glory of my Father that you should bear much fruit and then you will truly be my disciples.”
