Gospel Reflection - 23rd Sunday of Ordinary Time


Luke 14:25-33

On the surface, there isn’t much consolation to be found in today’s Gospel.  In fact, Jesus seems to be contradicting Himself.  Didn’t He ask us to love our neighbors?  That whatever we do to the least, we would be doing to Him?  So why would He now be telling us to hate our father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters?  All of that hatred would only be directed to Him, wouldn’t it?  And it doesn’t stop there, for then we are to pick up our crosses, and renounce our possessions-all without a drop of love!

But let us look beneath the surface.  Perhaps this hatred is not so much an ill will towards our dear ones, but rather a call to a more perfect love.  Sin and the frailty of our fallen nature pose obstacles to the perfection of love; they constantly pull our hearts away from God, tempting us to the love of things, which is an imperfect and tainted imitation of love.  The more we give of ourselves to this imperfect love, the farther we stray from God.  In following these foolish affections and attractions, the manner in which we love becomes weak and dependent on the senses.


Perhaps our Lord is asking us to lay aside our tainted love; to fix our eyes and focus our hearts on Him, so that He might teach us to become more like Him; and in doing so, our hearts will overflow with a pure, unselfish love of God, which will then strengthen us to carry our crosses, renounce worldly possessions, and love like Christ.


How do sin and the world distract you from loving like Christ?


So to love freely and perfectly, in what ways can you “put away the old self…and put on the new self, created in God’s way…”? (Eph. 4:22;24) 


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