I love my father and my mother. In fact, I love my wife, my brothers and sisters and all my relatives. So why is Jesus saying, “If anyone comes to me without hating his father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple”?
I was so disturbed by this reading that I had to call my mother to tell her, I love her. This is a human response to the words of Jesus, however, the meaning is not what we think! Jesus would never expect us to hate anyone for Jesus was sent to us out of love.
I believe that in Jesus’ time hate meant to like something less than something else. In Matthew’s gospel Jesus says, “He who loves father and mother more than me is not worthy of me!” Jesus, in today’s scripture passage is saying that putting anything before him is wrong, even ourselves. Jesus is telling us that in order to be his disciple, of which he calls all of us to be, we must put him before anything else. He is saying that everyone who wants to follow him must love him even more than our parents and family.
Are we followers of Jesus Christ in this sense? What comes first in our lives? For some it is money, for others it is what is in the bottle, for others it is the high they get from their drug addiction, for some it is personal pleasure.
For some it is missing mass on Sunday and Holy Days of Obligation for a few more hours of sleep. To the proud it is honor and praise. Seeking social justice for all races and classes is way down the list of what some people want. This is what Jesus meant. His example, his commands must come first.
We are extremely blessed in the canonization to sainthood of Mother Teresa of Calcutta this weekend. She realized and grabbed ahold of the words of Jesus. She let go of the things of this world to serve the Lord by loving and taking care of the poor. St. Teresa of Calcutta was the champion in promoting life for the unborn and seeking social justice for all.
St. Teresa of Calcutta is the example of what all of us should strive for, that holiness that frees us to be disciples of Jesus, that frees us to strive for the end means, that of our heavenly inheritance. Our goal in this life should not be possessions, money or prestige. It should be attaining in the end of our lives on earth the heavenly kingdom where we will meet God face to face.
If it were not so, would we have this church or would we even gather together in faith? Would God have sent his only begotten Son to show us the way? Take a good look. (point to the crucifix) Take a good look at what Jesus did for us! Would He have gone through this out of hate? No, he did this out of love for us. The very least we can do is to love Him, to put him ahead of everyone and everything, even those we love so dearly here on earth.
The first reading today from Wisdom says that it is hard to know what God wants of us because God is in heaven and we are on earth, at least for now! And Jesus says that we have to set our sights on heaven. We need to stay focused on that goal and not let anything or anyone be a distraction.
If anything on earth is a distraction from our heavenly goal, we need to renounce that and focus on heaven. How can we have focus on heaven and not love Jesus for what he did for us and to have the want to join with him in his Father’s heavenly kingdom?
The psalm today reminds us that everyone dies, and you can’t take it with you. Possessions, whether tangible or intangible, will be no good in the end. Our earthly connections will be severed. If we let those things be a distraction here, we might not get where we hopefully want to go.
In a few moments we will bow our heads and hearts to our Lord as we raise Him up in offering to the Father. Let us raise ourselves up with Jesus Christ to our heavenly Father and to ask him for strength to follow Jesus as Mother Teresa of Calcutta did in her earthly life.
Promise to put Jesus first in all things. Your presence here at Mass is one proof that you put Jesus ahead of a lot of other things. This is the start. Let us keep doing this and we will be on our way in being a true disciple of Christ!
Does this take sacrifice? Of course it does. Look at the sacrifices Jesus endured. Should we put off doing what we can for the poor only to worry about buying that new car even though the one we have does the job? Do we worry about how much money we have or do not have or do we look toward Jesus to help us in our struggles?
I entered into the retirement ranks as of this past Wednesday. I even got caught up worrying about finances and how I was going to be able to do this or that. It took me one time going to daily mass that put everything into perspective for me. I cannot say the same for one of my co-workers who was really in the dumps, struggling in a real way that made him upset.
I asked him why he was so distraught; why he was so stressed out. He told me that the time had come for him to make a $50,000.00 payment on the new house he was building in Mexico which was going to be his retirement home even though he owned a very nice house here on the Island. He was stressed trying to figure out if he should take the money out of his military savings he accumulated during 22 years of service or to pull it from another source.
Now, there is nothing wrong with building a house for retirement. The problem lied in what was most important to him. It was that house. That was all he could talk about. He allowed himself to get caught up material things of this earth. He seemed to have no other direction in his life. He allowed something like that house, which became more important to him than anything or anyone around him.
This is what Jesus is warning us about. Keep centered on him. Make him first in all things. I am reminded of a scripture passage that has always meant something to me and maybe it might touch you also. It is from Jeremiah29:13 which says: “You will seek Me and find me when you search for me with all your heart.” Seek Him. Aim for the kingdom. Place Jesus first and you will find what you have been searching for.