If ever there was someone who wanted to put you to the
test about your Christian faith, today's gospel text would make a perfect
weapon. “Whoever comes to me and does not hate their father and mother, spouse
and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and even their life itself, cannot be
my disciple.” So your Jesus wants you to hate your family – it says so right
here.
Now if you reply by saying that Jesus didn’t really say
that or mean that, you create a whole lot of trouble for yourself. Would that
not be true of anything the gospels quote Jesus as saying? Perhaps a little
parable might help us here.
Suppose you belonged to a family of a non-Christian religion.
Your father is a strong, devote believer and he strictly demands that you follow
this same religion and all its beliefs and practices. One day you come and
announce that you are going to become a Catholic; you believe that Jesus is the
son of God and that the Catholic Church is the true way to follow Christ. Your father
tells you that if you do this, he will disown you, strip you of your
inheritance and nothing more to do with you. And so you leave. In other words
it all or nothing.
In today's society, the worst thing you can do is promote
hate. Hate crimes are of the worst kind of evil. Here Jesus is using hyperbole;
which is an exaggerated statement or claim not meant to be taken literally. Like
when Jesus said “If your hand causes you to sin, cut it off. If your foot
causes you to sin, cut it off. And if your eye causes you to sin, pluck it out.
It is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than to have two
eyes and be thrown into hell.” Mk. 9:43
Jesus is not teaching hate, but he is teaching
unconditional love. To be his disciple Jesus wants our whole heart, our whole
soul, our whole mind with all our strength. The problem we face in the Church
today is mediocrity – I like some of the things the Church teaches but
certainly not everything. In Matthew’s account of this issue Jesus is warning
that to follow Him unconditionally will have its challenges.
“A man’s enemies
will be the members of his own household. Anyone who loves his father or mother
more than Me is not worthy of Me; anyone who loves his son or daughter more
than Me is not worthy of Me; and anyone who does not take up his cross and
follow Me is not worthy of Me. Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever
loses his life for My sake will find it. Mtt. 10:36
Jesus wants our whole heart first and above all. Half-hearted
faith will never last in today's world. It slowly drains away until it is all
gone. The choice is now in our hands.
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