Are You Radical Enough? – Homily for the 13th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year A

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Our Lord gives us a challenging call in the Gospel today. He tells us that whoever loves father, or mother, or son, or daughter more than Him is not worthy of Him. This sounds radical to us. Isn’t our family supposed to be number one on our list of priorities? Jesus reveals that all human loves and allegiances are subordinate to the love and allegiance owed first and foremost to Him. In other places in the Gospels, Jesus does uphold the importance of the family, but He also emphasizes a higher authority when the demands of discipleship and those of family oppose each other. Family is important! But even above the priority of family, there is an “urgent priority of the kingdom of God.”

Saint Augustine illustrates this priority of God in a sermon in which a Christian son responds to his parents when they ask him to do something that would put family above God. He tells them: “I will love you in Christ, not instead of Christ. You will be with me in him, but I will not be with you without him… Should I obey the ones who raised me and lose the One who created me?”  Ultimately, this struggle between faith and family is not a goal in itself, it’s not the way it’s meant to be, but sometimes it is an “inevitable consequence of the absolute allegiance Jesus claims from His disciples.”

The question for us, then, is whether Christ truly holds that first place in our lives, or whether something else has quietly taken His place. I believe that many of us Catholics are not radical enough in our faith. The word ‘radical’ comes from the Latin word radix, which means ‘root.’ To be a radical Christian is to be rooted completely in Jesus Christ, to allow Him to become the very center of our lives.

Now, by ‘radical,’ of course I don’t mean extremist activities or terrorism! I also don’t mean treating our involvement in the Church like a cult and neglecting our families. I mean making God the center and focus of our families. What does this look like? It might look like leaving in the middle of a family party on a Sunday in order to go to Mass. It might mean lovingly declining to participate in something that contradicts our faith, even when the invitation comes from someone we dearly love. It might mean making difficult sacrifices within marriage in order to remain faithful to God’s plan for family life. It might mean choosing to forgive someone when everyone else tells you not to. The list could go on… There are so many opportunities in our day and age to live a radical life of fidelity to the Lord and to the way He calls us to live, for our own sake but also for the sake of those around us.

Radicality is not something reserved for the “super Catholics” or the “holy rollers.” Radicality is essential to being a Christian. It is inherent in the call that Jesus gives to each and every one of us. We all need to ask ourselves: Am I living a radical relationship with Jesus Christ? Is my faith the ordering principle of my entire life? This plays out very concretely in our lives. How do we spend our time? What do we make sacrifices for? So many people are willing to make sacrifices for their careers, for their physical health, for friends, for family, for sports… What kind of sacrifices are we willing or not willing to make for the Creator and Lover of our souls?

When someone comes to me in confession, and they confess a number of “big” sins, and somewhere in their list they lightly mention also missing Mass on Sundays, I often respond to them by asking: “Of all the sins that you have confessed, can you guess which one I would be most concerned about?” Sometimes they just stay silent, but sometimes they try to guess, pointing to their “big” sins. But I tell them the sin I am most concerned about on their list is missing Mass on Sundays because that is such a clear indication that God has slipped down the list of priorities in their life, and if that has happened, then the gates are wide open to every other kind of sin and spiritual problem. The celebration of the Mass itself re-orders us and re-focuses the priorities of our life. What are we willing to make sacrifices for?

The Lord is calling each and every one of us here, myself included, to live a more radical life of faith. There is something very concrete, very specific that the Lord has in mind for you right now—a next step toward a more radical life of faith. Ask Him today, in this Mass, what it is for you. How is He inviting you to give more of yourself, more of your heart, more of your life to Him? You and I are called to give our whole selves to the One who has given His whole self to us. If we do this, everything else in our lives will fall into its proper place. If we strive for this every day, God will take care of us, even when it means that we have to “take up our cross” of suffering right next to Jesus. Do not be afraid to be a radical disciple.

“Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.”