Amid all the unknowns of today’s unprecedented chaos, there’s one thing we’re surely learning, how interconnected we all are. Fr. Brian Frain writes that this is such a contrast to the modern worldview of stringent individualism that we inherited from the Enlightenment era. It seems that we are not quite as autonomous as we imagined. And that’s a good thing. The demand for autonomy has bred an epidemic of loneliness, despair, and alienation. But we were not created to be self-sufficient. We were created to live connected to God and to each other. The key action of our verse today is to remain. It is translated in different ways: to stay, to abide, to live, to live in union. You can state it this way: “If you stay at home in me and I stay at home in you, you will bear much fruit.” Jesus is to be so much a part of our daily existence that He feels like home. Talking to Him becomes like talking to your best friend. Being with Him is like being at home on your favorite couch. We become like Jesus and do His great deeds not by trying harder or pumping up some spiritual energy. We do all of this by simply staying at home with Him. Bearing fruit then happens—because it’s ultimately His fruit, not ours. To make this point even more substantial, Jesus concludes this verse by stating the same truth in the negative: There is nothing you can do in terms of bearing fruit by yourself. Nothing. Zero. Zip. Let that sink in. It will change you.