From: Luke 14:25-33

Conditions For Following Jesus

[25] Now great multitudes accompanied Him (Jesus); and He turned and
said to them, [26] “If any one comes to Me and does not hate his own
father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes,
and even his own life, he cannot be My disciple. [27] Whoever does not
bear his own cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple. [28] For
which of you, desiring to build a tower, does not first sit down and count
the cost, whether he has enough to complete it? [29] Otherwise, when
he has laid a foundation, and is not able to finish, all who see it begin to
mock him, [30] saying, `This man began to build, and was not able to
finish.’ [31] Or what king, going to encounter another king in a war, will
not sit down first and take counsel whether he is able with ten thousand
to meet him who comes against him with twenty thousand? [32] And if
not, while the other is yet a great way off, he sends an embassy and asks
terms of peace. [33] So therefore, whoever of you does not renounce all
that he has cannot be My disciple.”

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Commentary:

26. These words of our Lord should not disconcert us. Love for God
and for Jesus should have pride of place in our lives and we should keep
away from anything which obstructs this love: “In this world let us love
everyone,” St. Gregory the Great comments, “even though he be our
enemy; but let us hate him who opposes us on our way to God, though
he be our relative [...]. We should then, love, our neighbor; we should
have charity towards all—towards relative and towards strangers—but
without separating ourselves from the love of God out of love for them”
(”In Evangelia Homiliae”, 37, 3). In the last analysis, it is a matter of
keeping the proper hierarchy of charity: God must take priority over
everything.

This verse must be understood, therefore, in the context of all of our
Lord’s teachings (cf. Luke 6:27-35). These are “hard words. True,
`hate’ does not exactly express what Jesus meant. Yet He did put it
very strongly, because He doesn’t just mean `love less,’ as some people
interpret it in an attempt to tone down the sentence. The force behind
these vigorous words does not lie in their implying a negative or pitiless
attitude, for the Jesus who is speaking here is none other than that Jesus
who commands us to love others as we love ourselves and who gives up
His life for mankind. These words indicate simply that we cannot be
half-hearted when it comes to loving God. Christ’s words could be
translated as `love more, love better’, in the sense that a selfish or
partial love is not enough: we have to love others with the love of God”
([St] J. Escriva, “Christ Is Passing By”, 97). See the notes on
Matthew 10:34-37; Luke 2:49.

As the Second Vatican Council explains, Christians “strive to please
God rather than men, always ready to abandon everything for Christ”
(Vatican II, “Apostolicam Actuositatem, 4).

27. Christ “by suffering for us not only gave us an example so that we
might follow in His footsteps, but He also opened up a way. If we follow
that way, life and death becomes holy and acquire a new meaning”
(Vatican II, “Gaudium Et Spes”, 22).

The way the Christian follows is that of imitating Christ. We can follow
Him only if we help Him bear His cross. We all have experience of
suffering, and suffering leads to unhappiness unless it is accepted
with a Christian outlook. The Cross is not a tragedy: it is God’s way
of teaching us that through sin we can be sanctified, becoming one with
Christ and winning Heaven as a reward. This is why it is so Christian
to love pain: “Let us bless pain. Love pain. Sanctify pain....Glorify
pain!” ([St] J. Escriva, “The Way”, 208).

28-35. Our Lord uses different examples to show that if mere human
prudence means that a person should try to work out in advance the
risks he may run, with all the more reason should a Christian embrace
the cross voluntarily and generously, because there is no other way he
can follow Jesus Christ. “`Quia hic homo coepit aedificare et non
potuit consummare! He started to build and was unable to finish!’ A
sad commentary which, if you don’t want, need be made about you:
for you possess everything necessary to crown the edifice of your
sanctification—the grace of God and your own will.” ([St] J. Escriva,
“The Way”, 324).

33. Earlier our Lord spoke about “hating” one’s parents and one’s very
life; now He equally vigorously requires us to be completely detached
from possessions. This verse is a direct application of the two fore-
going parables: just as a king is imprudent if he goes to war with an
inadequate army, so anyone is foolish who thinks he can follow our
Lord without renouncing all his possessions. This renunciation should
really bite: our heart has to be unencumbered by anything material if
we are able to follow in our Lord’s footsteps. The reason is, as He tells
us later on, that it is impossible to “serve God and Mammon” (Luke
16:13). Not infrequently our Lord asks a person to practice total, volun-
tary poverty; and He asks everyone to practice genuine detachment
and generosity in the use of material things. If a Christian has to be
ready to give up even life itself, with all the more reason should he re-
nounce possessions: If you are a man of God, you will seek to despise
riches as intensely as men of the world seek to possess them” ([St] J.
Escriva, “The Way”, 633). See the note on Luke 12:33-34.

Besides, for a soul to become filled with God it must first be emptied
of everything that could be an obstacle to God’s indwelling: “The doc-
trine that the Son of God came to teach was contempt for all things in
order to receive as a reward the Spirit of God in himself. For, as long
as the soul does not reject all things, it has no capacity to receive the
Spirit of God in pure transformation” (St. John of the Cross, “Ascent
of Mount Carmel”, Book 1, Chapter 5, 2).

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Source: “The Navarre Bible: Text and Commentaries”. Biblical text from the
Revised Standard Version and New Vulgate. Commentaries by members of
the Faculty of Theology, University of Navarre, Spain.

Published by Four Courts Press, Kill Lane, Blackrock, Co. Dublin, Ireland, and
by Scepter Publishers in the United States.

Mass Readings

First reading	Wisdom 9:13 - 18 ©
What man indeed can know the intentions of God? Who can divine the will of the Lord? The reasonings of mortals are unsure and our intentions unstable; for a perishable body presses down the soul, and this tent of clay weighs down the teeming mind. It is hard enough for us to work out what is on earth, laborious to know what lies within our reach; who, then, can discover what is in the heavens? As for your intention, who could have learnt it, had you not granted Wisdom and sent your holy spirit from above? Thus have the paths of those on earth been straightened and men been taught what pleases you, and saved, by Wisdom.

First reading

Wisdom 9:13 - 18 ©

What man indeed can know the intentions of God?
Who can divine the will of the Lord?
The reasonings of mortals are unsure
and our intentions unstable;
for a perishable body presses down the soul,
and this tent of clay weighs down the teeming mind.
It is hard enough for us to work out what is on earth,
laborious to know what lies within our reach;
who, then, can discover what is in the heavens?
As for your intention, who could have learnt it, had you not granted Wisdom
and sent your holy spirit from above?
Thus have the paths of those on earth been straightened
and men been taught what pleases you,
and saved, by Wisdom.

Psalm or canticle: Psalm 89

Second reading	Philemon 1:9 - 17 ©
I am appealing to your love, reminding you that this is Paul writing, an old man now and, what is more, still a prisoner of Christ Jesus. I am appealing to you for a child of mine, whose father I became while wearing these chains: I mean Onesimus. I am sending him back to you, and with him – I could say – a part of my own self. I should have liked to keep him with me; he could have been a substitute for you, to help me while I am in the chains that the Good News has brought me. However, I did not want to do anything without your consent; it would have been forcing your act of kindness, which should be spontaneous. I know you have been deprived of Onesimus for a time, but it was only so that you could have him back for ever, not as a slave any more, but something much better than a slave, a dear brother; especially dear to me, but how much more to you, as a blood-brother as well as a brother in the Lord. So if all that we have in common means anything to you, welcome him as you would me.

Second reading

I am appealing to your love, reminding you that this is Paul writing, an old man now and, what is more, still a prisoner of Christ Jesus. I am appealing to you for a child of mine, whose father I became while wearing these chains: I mean Onesimus. I am sending him back to you, and with him – I could say – a part of my own self. I should have liked to keep him with me; he could have been a substitute for you, to help me while I am in the chains that the Good News has brought me. However, I did not want to do anything without your consent; it would have been forcing your act of kindness, which should be spontaneous. I know you have been deprived of Onesimus for a time, but it was only so that you could have him back for ever, not as a slave any more, but something much better than a slave, a dear brother; especially dear to me, but how much more to you, as a blood-brother as well as a brother in the Lord. So if all that we have in common means anything to you, welcome him as you would me.

Gospel	Luke 14:25 - 33 ©
Great crowds accompanied Jesus on his way and he turned and spoke to them. If any man comes to me without hating his father, mother, wife, children, brothers, sisters, yes and his own life too, he cannot be my disciple. Anyone who does not carry his cross and come after me cannot be my disciple. ‘And indeed, which of you here, intending to build a tower, would not first sit down and work out the cost to see if he had enough to complete it? Otherwise, if he laid the foundation and then found himself unable to finish the work, the onlookers would all start making fun of him and saying, “‘ Here is a man who started to build and was unable to finish”. Or again, what king marching to war against another king would not first sit down and consider whether with ten thousand men he could stand up to the other who advanced against him with twenty thousand? If not, then while the other king was still a long way off, he would send envoys to sue for peace. So in the same way, none of you can be my disciple unless he gives up all his possessions.’

Gospel

Great crowds accompanied Jesus on his way and he turned and spoke to them. If any man comes to me without hating his father, mother, wife, children, brothers, sisters, yes and his own life too, he cannot be my disciple. Anyone who does not carry his cross and come after me cannot be my disciple.
‘And indeed, which of you here, intending to build a tower, would not first sit down and work out the cost to see if he had enough to complete it? Otherwise, if he laid the foundation and then found himself unable to finish the work, the onlookers would all start making fun of him and saying, “‘ Here is a man who started to build and was unable to finish”. Or again, what king marching to war against another king would not first sit down and consider whether with ten thousand men he could stand up to the other who advanced against him with twenty thousand? If not, then while the other king was still a long way off, he would send envoys to sue for peace. So in the same way, none of you can be my disciple unless he gives up all his possessions.’