Thirteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year C

This is going to be an especially brief homily this morning. Somehow high temperatures and deep thoughts just don't seem to go together very well.

But even so, this Gospel passage is worth a little bit of reflection. For a couple of reasons. First it sets the stage, really, for a series of Gospel readings that will stretch out over the next few weeks. Today's reading opens a lengthy passage in Luke, a passage that covers nearly nine chapters of Luke's Gospel. And what is noteworthy about these nine chapters is that they are made up of material that is, in presentation and emphasis, and often enough even in content, unique to Luke, found only in his Gospel. And since that means that the material involved has not been subjected to quite as much editing and re-writing and compiling over the centuries, it is a pretty good bet that passages such as this give us an especially accurate, faithful picture of the personality, the mission of Christ as it was originally perceived by the Apostles.

And these readings over the next few weeks will be underlining for us some very typically Lucan themes. The kindness of Christ, His compassion for those whose lives He touched. The resolution of Christ, His determination to carry His mission through to its completion, no matter what that might mean for Him. And surrounding that, a sense of having been caught up in the sweep of a drama, a chain of events whose real purpose, real value simply cannot be grasped, at least not yet. A sense that there is something going on in all that will follow, something that goes far beyond human ability to experience. And because of that, the radical nature of the response which Christ calls from His followers, the wholeness that must be a mark of the disciples of Christ.

It is just that, I think, wholeness, that is the point of this series of brief incidents that make up today's Gospel reading. The reading opens with an especially Lucan line. It says that when the time came to do so. Christ "firmly resolved" to go on to Jerusalem, to do what must be done, what he had been sent to do. That choice, that mission became the center of His life, the yardstick against which everything else that comes up, that demands His attention, His time, and His talents, must be measured.

With Luke's keen insight into the make up of human nature, he presents this powerful moment very emphatically. He does so first in the life of Christ, and then underlines it four times in brief accounts of the followers, or would be followers of Christ themselves facing such a moment.

And indeed, it is a moment that must be faced by anybody who would be anything. It is a moment of self creation, or better, perhaps, a moment of self pro creation, since it is never really done alone. A moment at which a person decides, this is what I am, this and nothing else. This is what my life means. This is its purpose, this is the value against which every other value must be measured from now on. And until that sort of decision is made, that moment of self procreation is placed in one's life, nothing really very valuable happens. Until then people may change a hundred times, depending on what is going on around them, but they do not really grow. They may re act in any number of ways, but they do not really act.

It is the point in a person's life at which one stops being at the mercy of the moment, of whatever influence is strongest right now, be that physical, emotional, economic, cultural, political, or whatever, and begins to act in spite of such influences, rather than because of them. It is a moment truly of liberation, in the deepest sense, as Paul uses the word in the second reading.

It is a moment of assigning, even imposing order and proportion on everything, every experience, every concern that makes up one's life, a moment of re valuing those concerns, so that they no longer conflict, detract from, even oppose the core values in one's life.

That is what is meant by the "wholeness" of discipleship. When we approach Christ, as did the disciples in this reading, and say, as in effect they did, "What do You want of me?" His answer to us is just what it was to them. "Simply enough, what have you got? I want everything you have, everything you are. All of your time, all of your talent, if you follow Me, you must do so as resolutely as I lead." Measured against such wholeness, it is simply not good enough to say as James and John did, "I will love everyone except those Samaritans, or except that guy over there that really gets on my nerves. I will show kindness to everyone, except to those who don't deserve it, or to those who are not kind to me. I will adhere to Christian values, Christian ethic, as long as it makes sense, as long as it doesn't interfere with my business ventures, my social life, or my personal relationships."

So. A theme that could be developed at a good deal of length, I think. But time enough for that in weeks to come.

Readings: 1 Kings 19:15-16, 19-21; Galatians 5:1, 13-18; Luke 9:51-62