JUNE 23^rd 2013. TWELFTH SUNDAY OF ORDINARY TIME

Gospel: Luke 9:18-24

­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­Translated from a homily by Don Fabio Rosini, broadcast on Vatican Radio

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Don Fabio’s reflection follows the Gospel reading ...

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GOSPEL                   Luke 9:18-24

One day when Jesus was praying alone in the presence of his disciples he put this question to them, 'Who do the crowds say I am?' And they answered, 'John the Baptist; others Elijah; and others say one of the ancient prophets come back to life'. 'But you,' he said 'who do you say I am?' It was Peter who spoke up. 'The Christ of God' he said. But he gave them strict orders not to tell anyone anything about this.

'The Son of Man' he said 'is destined to suffer grievously, to be rejected by the elders and chief priests and scribes and to be put to death, and to be raised up on the third day.'

Then to all he said, 'If anyone wants to be a follower of mine, let him renounce himself and take up his cross every day and follow me. For anyone who wants to save his life will lose it; but anyone who loses his life for my sake, that man will save it.

The Gospel of the Lord: Praise to you Lord Jesus Christ

Kieran's summary . . . Does the notion of renouncing yourself depress you? Does the news that you must lose your life in order to save it sound like bad news? When understood properly, this is the best news imaginable! The Gospel for Sunday begins with Peter’s confession that Jesus is the Christ, but Jesus orders the disciples to keep His identity secret. Why does He do that? Because Jesus does not want us to be content merely with recognizing who He is; He wants us to follow Him. Even the demons recognize that Jesus is Lord, but they certainly don’t make Him Lord of their lives! And how are we to follow Him? How are we to make Him Lord? By refraining from following ourselves. By refraining from making ourselves the measure of our own existence. Why are we inclined to think that self-renunciation is such a chore? It is the affirmation of self that is the ultimate chore! We are fixated with ourselves; with our image in the eyes of others; with things that are limited and mortal and full of deception. It is only when we renounce ourselves and make Christ the centre of our lives that we start to live fully. It is only then that our lives are renewed, restored and redeemed. Taking up the cross is not a dour chore; it is the daily rhythm of one who is heading for the resurrection; who has displaced himself from the centre of his life, and has made Jesus the focus.

How do we make sense of the different parts of this Gospel?

This Gospel seems to be composed of disparate parts. First, Jesus asks the disciples, “Who do the crowds say I am?” Then He asks the disciples who they think He is. Peter makes his confession and Jesus orders them to keep His identity a secret. Then Jesus foretells His suffering, declaring that anyone who wishes to follow Him must renounce himself and take up the cross. How are all of these various parts connected together?

Why does Jesus order the disciples to keep His identity a secret? Because He wants them to stay focussed on FOLLOWING Him, not just recognizing his identity

Who is Jesus? It is very important for each of us to be able to answer this question and it is essential that the Church be able to express who He is. Peter describes him as the “Christ of God”. This identifies Jesus with the Messiah, the One who is the fulfilment of the promises of God in the Old Testament. Peter makes his confession openly, in response to Jesus’ question, but then Jesus demands that His identity be kept a secret! Why is this? Because Jesus wants his disciples to keep focused on following Him, and not to remain at the stage merely of recognizing who he is. In today’s world we are inundated with information, chatter, and gossip. We know the most intimate and private details of other people’s lives. Many of us devote much time to reading and absorbing information. We run the very same risk as the disciples in the Gospel story: staying on the level of information and never making the leap to action. It is interesting to note that in the accounts of exorcisms in the Gospel, the demons always make a profession of faith in Jesus. They always recognize that He is the Christ, and Jesus always tells them to be quiet, just as he tells the disciples to stay quiet about his identity in this week’s Gospel! The demons may well profess the name of Jesus but they certainly do not follow him. The problem is not to recognize who Jesus is; the difficulty, once we have recognized him, is to follow him; to live by following in his steps, no longer simply accepting him in theory, but conforming ourselves to his person.

  

The starting point for following Jesus is to stop following ourselves

What is the starting-point for following Jesus? The Gospel tells us that the first thing we must do is renounce ourselves, take up our cross every day and follow Him. The renunciation of self is not something that is done one time for all. It is something that must be done continually. It is something that is a state of being and a rhythm of being of the person who journeys towards the resurrection, of the one who has found real life, of the one who loses that which deserves to be lost and saves that which deserves to be saved. It is important that we learn to discern that which merits being protected and chosen in our lives. We continually run the risk of being caught up in that which does not bring salvation at all.

Following Christ entails rejecting a life that is focussed on my own interests. It is not enough to recognize who Jesus is whilst living our lives within the parameters of our own egos.

Why do I have to lose my life in order to save it? Because there is a genuine risk that I might indeed recognize who Christ is, but then decide to hold on to my own way of doing things instead of following Him. There is a grave danger for Christians of acknowledging who Jesus is, accepting that He is the fulfilment of the promises of the Father, but then staying fundamentally attached to our own egos, remaining dependent on our own capacities, and not moving one centimetre beyond ourselves. We can fail to arrive at the fullness of life because we “follow” Christ only insofar as He is reduced to being an extension of ourselves and our own interests. We diminish Christ and make Him fit in with our ways of understanding things, our sentiments, our expectations. Insofar as we diminish Jesus in this way, we also diminish what He can accomplish in us.

It is sometimes thought that the goal of Christianity is to make Jesus known. But the real goal is to make him Lord of our lives.

The theme of this Gospel reading is certainly about following Jesus. It is a striking reading, intended to shake us from our lethargy. It emphasizes that the business of following Jesus only begins at what we are erroneously inclined to think is the final destination of the journey of the Christian: the recognition that He is the Christ. This error is commonplace. Many systems of thought hold that when man has understood his problems, then his problems are solved. This is not true. The true resolution of humanity’s problems is not just the diagnosis. but the cure. It is not enough just to recognize that Jesus is Lord, we must make Him Lord of our lives. In order to do this we must remove ourselves from the centre of our lives. Every Christian must “renounce himself, take up his cross every day and follow me”.

Renunciation of ourselves also includes renouncing self-criticism and negative preoccupations with ourselves.

The notion of renunciation is interesting. It implies that something that was previously affirmed must later be negated. It asserts that something that was once believed in must now be rejected. Each one of us must become that which has been rejected. And this is proper order! Long before we get to the stage of saying to Jesus, “You are the Christ”, how many times have we professed faith in ourselves! How many titles and names have we tried to attribute to ourselves! And sometimes some of these professions we have made to ourselves are entirely negative in character. The renunciation of ourselves is not just the renunciation of self-aggrandisement; it is also the renunciation of the negative thoughts we have towards ourselves. It is often even more difficult to renounce our negative self-opinions than it is to reject our pride. It is not just pride that Jesus asks us to renounce. Rather, we must reject all focus on ourselves, whether it be self-critical or self-acclaiming. A self-critical focus on ourselves still signifies that it is ourselves that we are following. Christ must become the focus of our lives. We must learn to live in an imbalanced way, making someone else the centre of gravity in our lives, finally oriented towards His resurrection, His beauty, His capacity to bring something new to our lives.

Renunciation of self is not depressing news. It is wonderful news! Non-adherence to ourselves permits us to attain the fullness of life when it is accompanied by the redemptive adherence to Christ

Does the notion of “losing our lives” really seem like such depressing news? I don’t think so. My life when centred on myself is nothing compared to what it can be when it is centred on Jesus. I should not fear the prospect of losing my life, but I should be terrorized at the prospect of “keeping” it, remaining fixated with it. My life is mortal, limited and full of self-deception. My real fear ought to be the risk of not coming to the fullness of life, life restored and renewed by the redemption. We should view this text as wonderful news! It shows us how to escape from the anguished captivity of our egoistic selves and arrive at the “you” of Christ.