The cost of discipleship
Worth every penny
Introduction
About discipleship
The first few weeks of
Ordinary Time are always devoted to the theme of discipleship—the following of
Jesus. Last Sunday the responsorial refrain was, “Here I am Lord; I come to do
your will” (Ps 40:8-9). In the gospel today Jesus is walking by the
Religion’s temptation
Religion is always tempted
to complicate matters. The Jews of old were masters at complicating the
following of Moses. The Law of Moses wasn’t really a Law (singular). It was,
instead, a ponderous corpus of 613 major laws and a whole constellation of
minor rules and regulations. It was an amazing amassment of rabbinical spin down
through the ages. That enormous corpus weighed heavily upon the people. One day
a lawyer (a teacher of the Law of Moses), himself confused by such a maze his
religion placed on him, approached Jesus asking which of all the countless
commandments and rules and regulations came first. The poor man was simply
trying to sort things out and come to a sense of priority in his life.
Jesus replied saying, “This
is the first and greatest commandment of all.” Then he simply recited the Shema
Yisrael for him. (That’s prayer which every observant Jew recites
three times a day.) “Shema Yisrael.” “`Hear, oh
On
many other occasions Jesus sorted out discipleship for those teachers of the
Law, those gung-ho legalists. One Sabbath he and his disciples were walking
through a wheat field, and his disciples were hungry and were picking the grain
and eating it. The Pharisees and their lawyers complained saying, “Sir, your
disciples are harvesting grain on the Sabbath and that’s forbidden.” They were
picking handfuls of grain because they were terribly hungry, and there was no
McDonalds in sight for miles. That was considered to be “harvesting,” and
harvesting on the Sabbath was strictly forbidden by the Law of Moses!
Exasperated by such legalism Jesus said to them, “Oh, if you people only
knew the meaning of the Scripture verse from the Prophet Hosea, which says,
`It’s compassion I want from you, not your animal sacrifices,’ you wouldn’t be
condemning innocent people” (Mt 12:1-8; Hosea 6:6).
Legalism: a big temptation
Legalism was an eternal
temptation for religion in Jesus’ day. It’s still an eternal temptation for
religion. We recall again the story out of
“Minime!” (“By no means!”),
you cry out in Latin, thinking those scholars might understand. By no means is
legalism the following of Jesus. He is our way, but wherever it is he leads us
it’s certainly not into legalism. At the end of the day legalism is basically
cheap discipleship; it doesn’t cost you one red cent, but it does make everyone
else pay up. It made that compassionate priest pay up and the first Communion
girl pay up. Recall Bonhoeffer’s book, The Cost of Discipleship. His
bottom line is that cheap discipleship is the deadly enemy of the church; we
are fighting today for costly discipleship.
Recently I concelebrated at
a funeral liturgy of a dear friend of many years. When Communion time came
the chief priest said, “Catholics may now come up and receive Holy Communion!”
What could those words possibly mean? All Catholics know when it is time to
come to Communion. It was legalism in subtle gear or maybe not so subtle gear.
The chief priest was executing some directive to keep non-Catholics away. Keep
non-Catholics away! My gosh, it should be our delight that they want to come.
Keep non-Catholics away! My gosh, it should be our glory to invite them to come
to our banquet, just as it should be their glory to invite us to come to their
banquet. “Minime!” (“By no means!”), you cry out in Latin, hoping those
educated people might understand. By no means is legalism the following of
Jesus. He is our way, but wherever it is he leads us it’s certainly not into
legalism.
Sexual moralism: another big temptation
Sexual moralism is another
one of those eternal temptations especially for religion. Sexual moralism
is the religiosity that considers sex as either the height of all morality or
the depths of all immorality. Sexual moralism is the religiosity that goes
in hot pursuit of a constitutional amendment to ban same sex marriages.
Sexual moralism is the self-righteous atmosphere that suspended the entire work
of the Nation for two whole years, as Congress went in hot pursuit of the
sexual escapades of President Clinton. “Minime!” By no means is that the
following of Jesus. It’s cheap discipleship because it didn’t cost the prurient
pursuers of Bill Clinton one red cent, but it did, indeed, make him pay up.
Jesus has a poor track
record when it comes to sexual moralism. When some dirty old men catch a woman
in adultery and drag her before Jesus in the temple, and want to throw stones
and the Law of Moses at her, he refuses to buy into their sexual moralism.
Instead he bends down and with his finger scribbles “ho-hum” in the dust on the
marble floor of the temple (Jn 8: 1-11). “Minime!” By no means is sexual
moralism the following of Jesus. He is our way, but he doesn’t lead us into
sexual moralism. It’s cheap discipleship. It didn’t cost those prurient
pups pursuing the woman one red cent, but they were, indeed, bent on making her
pay up with all she had: death by stoning.
The Good Samaritan
Jesus’
great parable of the Good Samaritan is all about the cost of discipleship. Once
upon a time a man was going from
That’s
the following of Jesus. It takes you on the road that makes you a Good Samaritan.
That’s the following of Jesus. It costs you something. It makes you show
compassion. It makes you slam on the brakes, even though you are short on
time, and it makes you take the time to do what the moment calls for. That’s
the following of Jesus. It costs you something. It makes you dig deep into your
pocket to help someone less fortunate than yourself on the road to
The good Jewish CEO
When
CEO Aaron Feuerstein’s fabric mill burned down in December of 1995, he didn’t
take the insurance money and run. That devout Jew, who reads both his beloved
Shakespeare and the Talmud every evening, stuck with his 2400 employees.
He gave them all a $275 Christmas bonus and a $20 coupon for food, then
announced that for the next 30 days they would all be paid their full salaries
and that their health insurance would be paid for the next 90 days plus a
promise that he would try to have his factory in full operation for them within
90 days. Time magazine for the 8th of January, 1996, reported
that Feuerstein was true to his word; he continued to pay his employees in
full, at a cost of 1 ½ million dollars a week and at an average wage of 12 ½
dollars an hour.
That’s
the following of Jesus. It’s costly. It’s digging into your pocket to help
someone waylaid by fire on the road to
The good Irish bartender
I
got an e-mail last Sunday. The person who sent it knows that you have to be
very simple with me when it comes to the super-information highway of computers.
The e-mail read, “Go to www.abcnews.com.
On the right hand side (the hand you make the sign of the cross with) near the
bottom of the screen under Wal-Mart, click person of the week. On the next
screen under Jan, 2005, click on Jerry Quinn.” I blindly obeyed, and, lo and
behold, there was Jerry Quinn.
He’s
52 years young, owns a bar and restaurant in
Quinn
has been saving his money for a major down payment on a two-bedroom apartment
in a suburban part of
Piedra
and Quinn met. Said Quinn, “He hugged me and kissed me and told me I was an
angel. As I thanked him I could feel the shivers going up and own my back.”
That’s the following of Jesus--stopping to pour the oil of compassion upon
someone waylaid by illness on the road to
The
article doesn’t say a word about Quinn being a good Catholic, as good Irishmen
are known to be. He might even be a roaming Catholic as many are today.
But whatever he is, how can anyone possibly deny he’s a wonderful
follower of Jesus?
Conclusion
Worth every penny
The sun finally set that
busy day when the priest, the Levite and the Samaritan were rushing off to
The Good Samaritan, too,
finally made it home that night. Though he had been late for his business
appointment (because he stopped), and though he was exhausted by the energy
expended upon the poor man waylaid by robbers, still there was a sweet song
singing in his heart. It was the song that sings in the heart of one who
follows someone greater than one’s self. It was the song that sings in the
heart of one who pays the cost of something worthwhile, and who makes a
difference on the highway of life.
That
same sweet song started singing also in the heart of Jerry Quinn when Piedra
hugged and kissed him and told him he was an angel. It will continue to sing on
in his heart through the months and years ahead as his story unfolds for him in
rippling waves. And in the evening of life when he’s finally back home from his
costly trip to
-----Original
Message-----
From: Alexis [mailto:aluzi1@wi.rr.com]
Sent:
To: Mary Jo
Subject:
Mary Jo, here is
Discipleship2005. Again many thanks from all three of us.