Today’s readings: 2 Kings 4, 8-11.13-16; Romans 6, 3-4.8-11; Matthew 10, 37-42.
Losing life to find it, dying in order to have a new life is the dynamic of the Christian life in a nutshell, the Gospel wisdom about the right appreciation of life itself. It remains tremendously challenging, in the face of the culture we breathe, to drive home the message that this is what makes us fully alive and what is truly rewarding in life.
It is not surprising that what St Paul writes in his letter to Romans was the bone of contention in Luther’s Reformation in the 16th century. Even then, Christianity was at a crossroads, demanding a fresh outlook. And if we honestly read the times we live in we should realise that we too are on the threshold of a new Reformation. It suffices to confront mainstream Christianity with the Gospel criteria.
The history of Christianity is always written from the perspective of an institution battling for survival. But if we read Christianity from the point of view of people who incarnated the philosophy of Jesus and translated the Gospel in terms of a commitment for change, we would end up with quite a different picture.
Reading the Gospel as it is articulated in the lives of Dorothy Day, Thomas Merton, Martin Luther King, Mother Teresa and other modern-day prophets provides a fresh and liberating version of what Jesus is saying in today’s gospel. Their commitment and idea of change gives a reading of Christian life very different from that we have been perpetuating for ages.
Czech theologian and philosopher Tomas Halik, in his autobiographical book From the Underground Church to Freedom, writes: “When Narcissus leans over the surface of the lake he sees only himself, and his eye remains fixed to the surface and his own image there. This superficiality turns out to be fatal for him. The gaze of the believer must penetrate deeper. Only then will the depth not become a malignant trap.”
Our mainstream religiosity is effectively emerging as such a ‘malignant trap’ that suffocates the true spirit of the Gospel. In today’s gospel text there is a very important shift that reveals Jesus as an adult educator and marks a turning point in the journey of his disciples. Jesus refrains from being a populist, admired for saying and doing good things.
Following in his footsteps and emulating him is something radically different, and today’s gospel establishes the concrete and radical instructions for those who really want to engage in a commitment for change. There are times when the need to shake the existing order surfaces with some force. This happens also in religion and perhaps should happen more frequently.
Jesus is not the peacemaker but the agent provocateur. When religion loses its catalytic energy, when it lacks prophecy, it becomes arid and only legalistic. This explains why religion was often a status quo defender and on the side of power, even supporting violent regimes in various parts of the globe. This is the exact opposite of what religion should stand for.
Religion is either commitment for change or else it becomes a recipe for illusions about life. We are living a kairos moment if we really want to resonate more with what today is expected of religion. Mediocrity is welcome nowhere today, let alone in religion. The Gospel goes to the roots of the problem, provoking in us the question whether we are fit for purpose as Christians in this day and age.
Even the world around us is posing this same question. Because for every age a fresh reading of the Gospel is needed, and when that remains lacking, Christianity itself risks being anachronistic.