Daily Mass Gospel Reflection - Harsh and Dreadful Love

Friends, in today’s Gospel, Jesus lays down the conditions for discipleship:
“Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me,
and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me;
and whoever does not take up his cross and follow after me
is not worthy of me.
Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.”

There is a line from the illuminator of the St. John’s Bible that states:
“We have to love our way out of this.”
There is nothing wimpy or namby-pamby or blind about this conviction.
When we love extravagantly, we are not purposely blinding ourselves to moral realities—just the contrary.
Love is not a sentiment, but “a harsh and dreadful thing,” as Dostoevsky said.

This is just what Jesus shows on his terrible cross.
And this is just what we, his followers, must imitate.
Taking up the cross means not just being willing to suffer
but being willing to suffer as he did,
absorbing violence and hatred through our forgiveness and nonviolence.

+++Jesus said to his Apostles:
“Do not think that I have come to bring peace upon the earth.
I have come to bring not peace but the sword.
For I have come to set
a man against his father,
a daughter against her mother,
and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law;
and one’s enemies will be those of his household.

“Whoever loves father or mother more than me
is not worthy of me,
and whoever loves son or daughter more than me
is not worthy of me;
and whoever does not take up his cross
and follow after me is not worthy of me.
Whoever finds his life will lose it,
and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.

“Whoever receives you receives me,
and whoever receives me receives the one who sent me.
Whoever receives a prophet because he is a prophet
will receive a prophet’s reward,
and whoever receives a righteous man
because he is righteous
will receive a righteous man’s reward.
And whoever gives only a cup of cold water
to one of these little ones to drink
because he is a disciple–
amen, I say to you, he will surely not lose his reward.”

When Jesus finished giving these commands to his Twelve disciples,
he went away from that place to teach and to preach in their towns.+++

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