Memorial of Saint Teresa of Jesus, virgin and doctor of the Church
Occasionally, I take the time to make bread or beer, both of which use yeast as a leaven. Leaven is mentioned in today’s Gospel (Luke 12:1-7) and the concept is important for understanding today’s scriptures, as well as for understanding our own spiritual lives.
Leaven is used in various foods to make them rise, usually by fermentation, which is a process that changes some of the carbs in the food into carbon dioxide. Carbon dioxide is, of course, a big part of the air that we breathe – it is also this air that makes bread rise and beer foam.
I’ve learned some things over the years about leaven. First of all, finding out what happens with the leaven takes time –an awful lot of that time when I can do absolutely nothing but wait. Second, it’s always kind of a mystery as to how the bread or the beer will turn out.
When I bake bread, I dissolve the yeast in water: that water has to be the right temperature. If too hot,
I kill the yeast; if too cold, the yeast won’t become active. I won’t necessarily know if I’ve done it the right way until I’ve mixed in the other ingredients and let the yeast (hopefully) keep rising and rising, till
I have a nice, high loaf of bread dough.
Beer provides even more of a mystery: there, I add the yeast to a mixture of boiled hops and malt, cooled down to, hopefully, the right temperature. And, depending on the kind of beer, I also have to be able to keep the yeast mixture at the right temperature level and the right level of darkness throughout fermentation in order to get the right flavor. (I.e. Lagers have to be maintained at cooler temperatures than ales.) To get beer to ferment in the right way, you’ve got to wait much longer than with bread: a couple weeks (at least) in a large bottle, and then at least another week in smaller individual bottles. It is hard to wait, but if we didn’t, the beer DEFINITELY wouldn’t be good. By waiting, we have the possibility of good beer, but that final outcome is hidden.
These aspects of the unknown and waiting are what I find crucial for understanding today’s scriptures. The unknown is part of what Jesus is getting at in the Gospel. It is not necessarily easy to see the “hypocrisy” of the Pharisees. After all, the Pharisees are the ones who are following the Law as closely as possible: they look like the good guys, the ones who always obey the law. But Jesus says that at some point in the future, what is in darkness will be revealed. So, we must be careful with the kind of “leaven” that we invite into our lives. What things in our lives are forming and shaping us, adding “air” to our lives in ways that may not be helpful? Conversely, what leavens help us? Are there ways in which we can be good leaven for the world?
The aspect of waiting is part of what we see in today’s first reading (Ephesians 1:11-14). Paul is mentioning our inheritance, and God’s glory, both of which we are waiting for and both of which we hope for even while we don’t entirely know for certain. It is difficult to wait, though. How often do we think to ourselves, or hear friends say: “Why isn’t God answering my prayers?”
Today is the memorial of Theresa of Jesus, who has a famous prayer about waiting in the face of the unknown: “Let nothing disturb you. Let nothing trouble you. All things are passing. God never changes. Patience obtains all things. He who has God, finds he lacks nothing. God alone suffices.”
- Jana M. Bennett