13th. SUNDAY of the Year C
(I Kings 19:16, 19-21; Galatians 5:1, 13-18; St Luke’s
Gospel 9:51-62)
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Dear Brothers and
Sisters in Christ, we have something about the nature of an authentic Christian
vocation in our Gospel reading today, something we need to think about and try
to learn from.
First of all, we heard
that the Sons of Thunder, James and John, on hearing that the Samaritans of a
village they were approaching would not welcome Jesus destined for Jerusalem,
wanted to call down fire from heaven to consume them, but:
Jesus turned and rebuked them, and
they journeyed to another village.
Jesus had called the
two sons of Zebedee, fellow-fishermen with Peter and Andrew, but at the present
He was having to be very patient with them because their natural impulsiveness and
decisiveness needed to be firmly tempered and gradually reformed for Jesus’ own
purposes but, most certainly, without being crushed.
As they proceeded on
their journey someone said to Jesus:
I will follow You wherever You go!
And Jesus answered him:
Foxes have
dens and birds of the sky have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to rest
His head.
Those were words of enlightenment
so that the enthusiastic young man could make a better judgement of what he
wanted for his future. Nothing further
is heard of him in the Gospel.
However, there is
another man they met, and Jesus said, as soon as He saw him it would seem: Follow Me.
Obviously, Jesus saw
something very good in him; something we can only try our best to fathom out what
it might have been.
The Gospel goes on and
tells us that the young man heard and understood what Jesus had said to him:
But he replied, ‘Lord, let me go
first and bury my father’.
Notice that he answers
Jesus immediately as ‘Lord’; from that call of Jesus, the young man knew Jesus
as his ‘Lord’. Others will say ‘I will follow
You Lord, but …’ This one, chosen and
called by Jesus, says first of all ‘Lord’.
He then went on to
ask, as you have just heard, ‘let me go first and bury my father’.
First of all, wanted to
do what he considered an important duty, that is, as son, to bury his
father. Now, Jesus above all loved His
Father, and that surely made the young man’s request echo deeply in Jesus’ own
heart.
But that was by no
means all. Jesus knew intimately the
prophets of Israel, the great ones who foretold of His coming and destiny but
also those nearer to His day who spoke of the times He might well experience
Personally, and one of them, Malachi, had these words about times soon to come
(Malachi 4: 5-6):
Behold, I will
send you Elijah the prophet before the great and terrible day of the Lord
comes. And he will turn the hearts of fathers
to their sons and the hearts of sons to their fathers, lest I come and smite
the land with a curse.
We are well aware that
Jesus knew that passage from the prophet, because He told His questioning
disciples that John the Baptist had been the Elijah mentioned by the prophet;
and now, here before Him at this very moment, was a young man whose heart was
indeed being turned to his father, asking Jesus that he might go and fulfil his
duty to his recently deceased father.
But there is something
yet more, something much more mysterious, for Jesus – giving the permission
requested of Him – said:
Let the dead bury their dead. But you, go and proclaim the Kingdom
of God.
You, young man, whom I
have just called to follow Me and who have, indeed, recognized Me as your Lord,
you are not one of the dead whom I tell you to let them bury their dead:
I have just chosen you because My Father has already chosen you for Me, therefore,
I tell you:
YOU, go and proclaim the Kingdom
of God.
Now, we know from the
Gospel that Jesus proclaimed the Kingdom of God from the very beginning of His
public ministry exclusively, save for the Twelve alone whom:
He (once) called
together and gave them power and authority over all demons, and to cure diseases. He sent them to preach the kingdom of God and
to heal the sick. (Luke 9:1-2)
We hear no more of
that very special young man chosen by Jesus, save that Jesus did Himself say
later:
The law and
the prophets lasted until John; but from then on, the kingdom of God is
proclaimed, and everyone who enters does so with violence. (16:16)
Dear People of God, be
well aware that the Father can call, speak to, souls before the call of Jesus
reaches them, or sounds meaningfully in their minds and hearts, but that prevenient
call of the Father always urges towards Jesus Who most assuredly knows who is
being thus sent to Him by the Father,, and why.
We have yet another
possible-vocation who said to Jesus in the Gospel today:
I will follow you,
Lord, but first let me say farewell to my family at home.
He says he will
follow, but first ….
Jesus, for him will be Lord, when …
Moreover, he requests the
opportunity to do not an important duty so much as an emotional leave-taking of
family and, most probably, friends at home; which in no way relates to an
immediate and life-changing vocational opportunity from God.
(To him) Jesus said, “No one who sets a hand to the
plow and looks to what was left behind is fit for the kingdom of God.” (Luke 9:62)
Dear friends of
Jesus in Mother Church, so much is done these days in response to people, so
little in response to Jesus. People at the best can be ministers, guides,
helpers, even a few can be authorities in the way of Jesus … but not to the
extent of being reverenced, ‘worshipped’, as the nearest to Jesus for us here
on earth.
Jesus is our all and He is ‘available’ to us, and for us, here on earth: we have His Spouse, His infallible Church, our Mother, in which His most Holy Spirit abides; and we have Jesus’ own real, sacramental Presence – His very Body and Blood – in Mother Church’s sacrifice of Holy Mass.
Jesus’ Holy
Spirit abides in no individual person however holy … and that means that
no individual whomsoever can stand-in for Jesus in our soul and conscience. Jesus alone merits our all, and that is, in
Him and with Him, for the Father’s glory in heaven and His will on earth.
Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ, what a privilege it is for us to be disciples of Jesus, sons and daughters of Mother Church, moved by the most Holy Spirit to walk along the ways of Jesus, outlined for us by Mother Church and her Scriptures, in the hope and anticipation of finding our ultimate home in heaven, celebrating our Father’s feast of love, gratitude, and thanksgiving.
(2022)
62 (To him) Jesus said, “No one who sets a hand to the plow and looks to
what was left behind is fit for the kingdom of God.” Luke 9:61–62
(NAB)
Malachi 4:5-6 (NAB)
Now
I am sending to you Elijah, the prophet.
Before the day of the LORD comes, the great and terrible day; He will turn the
hearts of fathers to their sons, and the hearts of sons to their fathers, lest
I come and strike the land with utter destruction.
