Todays’ Missal bible readings in the Roman Catholic tradition is an eclectic heady mix of readings on clarity, compassion, and commitment, and how different each reading may appeal to some who ruminate on the contextual relevance of the readings for the times of the inspired writers, and how we to be willing collaborators in living God’ message in the present.
And what woes the present have for us, as we grapple with the conflagration of secular disorder and dismay on a grand scale, led by mortals who should know better but would not.
(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.
(Second reading. Philemon 9-10,12-17) 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.’
If one were to ask which passage appeals to us the most, we would have gotten a mixture of responses. Which appeal to you most: the call to clarity of divine intent through the Holy Spirit? The gentle persuasion of St Paul, for a matter that he could have been more assertive, or the call for first counting (and accepting) the cost, before committing?
I personally found Jesus’ parable resonating and quite consistent with how we, reasoned and rational creatures, think – calculate – visualize- and consolidate our decision-making in matrices, or just with intuitive choices.
But the summative exhortation in the parable makes mockery that process to a conclusion of total commitment and abandonment. “So in the same way, none of you can be my disciple unless he gives up all his possessions. “
It is a reality check for those of us who are adept at calculating and counting. And even keeping some cards close to us for security. By putting an absolute imperative into the relativity of a well-trodden choice architecture, we are invited to abandon ourselves to the freedom of not calculating, not losing, only gaining.
