Urban Hermit at 3156 Doyle Street, Toledo, OH 43608-2006 US - Year C, 23rd - 25th

Wisdom 9:13-18a—The holy spirit of God brings wisdom to makes our paths straight.

Psalm 90:  In every age, O God, you have been our refuge.

Philemon 9b-10, 12-17—Welcome him as you would me.

Luke 14:25-33—Anyone who does not renounce all his possessions cannot be my disciple.

Today’s readings point to the cost of discipleship, and how significant it is!

In the Book of Wisdom we are urged to renounce our timid deliberations, our unsure plans, our corruptible body, our earthen shelter, all our concerns, that our path to God may be made straight by the Holy Spirit.

In Paul’s letter to Philemon, we are urged to renounce our superiority over others, embracing even slaves as brothers and sisters. 

Finally, in Luke Jesus tells us to renounce our parents, children, spouses, siblings, our very life!   As Jesus emptied himself of all the power and might of his divinity to walk on earth as a human being, so we are called to empty ourselves of the trappings of our humanity that we might walk with him.

Indeed, this is radical, costly discipleship.  Let’s ask ourselves what it is that we are not able to renounce.  What keeps us from discipleship?

24^th Sunday in Ordinary Time (C):  Important to God

Exodus 32:7-11, 13-14—Moses implored God, and God relented.

Psalm 51—In the greatness of your compassion, wipe out my offense. [Response:  Luke 15:18—I will rise and go to my father.

1 Timothy 1:12-17—I have been mercifully treated.

Luke 15:1-32—Lost sheep, lost coin, lost son:  every one is important.

Every single individual is of paramount importance to God!  Even me, says Paul in the first letter to Timothy, even the stiff-necked people of Exodus, even us.

Lest we misunderstand, Luke puts three parables in Jesus’ mouth to make certain that it’s clear.  The shepherd leaves the ninety-nine to pursue one stray sheep.  The woman sweeps the entire house looking for one lost coin.  And the father goes outside for both sons, first for the profligate who repents and then for the unrepentant angry one.

These are radical actions, total commitment, complete service.  As the scriptures tell us, not a hair on our heads goes unnoticed by God.  Everything we do, every person we meet, is essential to the God.  The one I am with right now, the one in need right now, is the one I must tend.  The one who is lost right now is the one who must be found.  The one who needs forgiveness right now is the one I must forgive. 

Sometimes it seems that we wait around for "big" things to do for God:  we want to imitate the Mother Teresas and the Martin de Porreses of the world.  We want to minister in meaningful, significant ways.  We want to spend our life-times in great deeds of service to humanity.  It's easy to ignore the small things that make up the fabric of our lives, the little obediences and services that add up to a holy life.

Jesus reminds us that it is in the single moments of decision that our moral judgment tells all about us.  It is in our willingness to seek out the one of a hundred who is straying.  It is in our effort in searching for the one in ten who is lost.  It is in our open-armed welcoming of the one who has wronged us and seeks reconciliation.

And God is faithful to the promise even when we are not.  God seeks the stray, the lost one, the sinner.  Even our worst offenses are not so much that they cannot be forgiven.  Likewise the worst offenses of others are not so much that we should not forgive them.

We are on both sides—we are the woman who seeks and the lost coin itself; we are the shepherd who searches and the sheep that strays; we are the prodigal returning and the father awaiting.  As we go about this week, let's live in the moment as it comes to us.  Let's look for the chances that lie waiting for us to be found and to be forgiven as well as the opportunities to seek and find and serve. 

Amos 8:4-7—God will not forget those who cheat and destroy the poor.

Psalm 115:  Praise the Lord who lifts up the poor.

1 Timothy 2:1-8—It is my wish that in every place people should pray, that we may lead a quiet and tranquil life.  Lift up holy hands, without anger or argument.

Luke 16:1-13—No servant can serve two masters.  You will either hate one and love the other, or be devoted to one and despise the other.  You cannot serve both God and mammon.

How are we, as Christians in the United States of America, to proceed in the aftermath of the death and destruction wreaked by terrorists on New York, Pennsylvania, and Washington, D.C.?  How are we to go on in the post-9/11 world?  How are we to understand our country's unjust war against Iraq fought under the pretense of revenge for 9/11?  Today’s readings give us a clear vision.

In the first reading, Amos tells us plainly that God will not forget those who cheat and destroy the poor.  One significant question that we must ask ourselves is whether we have cheated the poor or destroyed the poor, and the answer is, unfortunately, yes.  If we have purchased clothing made in sweatshops, we have cheated the poor.  If we have withheld the full portion of our charity, we have destroyed the lives of those who need our help.  Amos reminds us that “God will not forget” our cheating and destruction, just as God will not forget the cheating and destruction of others.

Then Paul, in the first letter to Timothy, gives us the vision of Christian community that must be our model in these trying days.  He asks for ”supplications, prayers, petitions, and thanksgivings” for everyone, especially for those in authority, “that we may lead a quiet and tranquil life in all devotion and dignity.”  Then he tells us that the one God of us all “wills everyone to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.”  Our reading concludes with the picture of people lifting up “holy hands” in every place, without anger or argument.  How deep is our need for the fulfillment of that vision!

Finally, the lectionary sets before us the parable of the unjust steward, warning us that we cannot serve two masters.  If we are to be Christians, we are called to love instead of hate.  If we seek vengeance, we cannot be Christians.  The message of the Gospel is clear for us!  We must put aside our anger and our desire for revenge, natural and normal as they are, and put on the mantle of the forgiving Christ. 

And it will not be easy for us.  All around us our friends and neighbors and family members and colleagues are calling for annihilation of Osama bin Ladin, of Pakistan’s Taleban government, of anyone and anything connected to Islam and the Middle East.  The rhetoric of hate swells up around us, threatening to overpower the whispers of love.

Our government, acting in the name of each and every one of us, has wreaked vengeance in Iraq by initiating and waging an unjust war in spite of the objections of almost all the other countries of the world.  The United States of America cannot claim to be a Christian country; its actions since 9/11/01 prove otherwise.  With that in mind, individuals are challenged to be exceedingly careful to put our priorities in order:  God before country, not country before God.  The God of peace wills us to bring peace, and so we respond by tending to the duties of our lives in a way that brings peace. 

Let us keep in mind that we serve one God through Christ and that we are first of all called to love by our God.  And let us pray:  Oh, God, one God of us all, take away the hatred from my heart.  Fill me with compassion for those who have died, with compassion for those who mourn, with compassion for those who turn to killing as a means of protest or revenge.  Make me an instrument of your peace.