The Thirteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time [A]
II Kgs 4:8-11,14-16 + Rom 6:3-4,8-11 + Mt 10:37-42
July 2, 2017
“‘Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.’”
Saint Paul, in writing to the Romans about their baptism, equates baptism with death. He rhetorically asks them, “Are you unaware that we who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death?” This is a rhetorical question because the Roman Christians are not unaware of this truth. Yet Paul needs to ask it because the choices of their lives don’t reflect this truth. In other words, they’ve not been practicing what Paul’s been preaching.
In today’s Gospel passage, Jesus addresses a similar discrepancy. His words might seem harsh, but in fact they’re very loving. The seeming harshness comes from the fact that His words are literally radical: they go to the root of practicing the Christian Faith, which is death to self.
Jesus is putting everything—or rather, everyone—in his place. From the place of one’s father and mother in one’s life, to the place of one’s son and daughter, to the place of oneself in one’s own life, Jesus insists that He must be put first. Continue reading