Path To Sunday

How can you have victory through defeat? It’s crazy, right? The two things (victory and defeat) are contradictory. When it comes to Christ, however, it is (paradoxically) true. Perhaps we should say, rather, that Christ has victory in what seems like defeat.

This is good news for us. If you struggle or suffer, then today’s celebration of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross should give you hope. As St. Paul tells us in the second reading, Christ suffered death on the cross, but through it came to victory. He can do the same for us. What we need to do is understand how it works.

When humanity sinned, it rejected a loving relationship and friendship with God. (That is the point of the story of Adam and Eve). Since it is love that brings life, sin brings death. The result of original sin was not just death of the body, but also death of the soul. Hell is about living in such a way that you have no tangible sense of God’s presence: no relationship with God.

To save us, therefore, God not only had to forgive our sins, but also convince us to freely choose to love him again. So how was he going to do that? By becoming human and dying on the Cross. To convince us to love him, God showed us the greatest sign of love possible: giving his own life for us.

It was the bridegroom showing his beloved that he loves her to death, and would give anything for her. Or as it is written in today’s gospel “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him might not perish but might have eternal life” (John 3:16-17).

At the same time, Christ himself goes into death in order to defeat death. He is like the knight who enters the belly of the dragon and then kills the beast from the inside to then emerge with victory. With Jesus, love wins over sin precisely by giving its life in death. If sin is the opposite of love, then Christ wins by loving unto death.

If you understand that, then you can understand how Jesus can bring victory to our suffering and our struggles. Sometimes Jesus does work the physical miracles by curing an illness, or getting a person a better job. However, he often does not. The real miracle is how he changes our hearts. He cannot force our free will. When we encounter the cross in our lives, whether that is sickness or financial distress, if we embrace it in Jesus, then it can transform our hearts.

Discipleship is more than simply following Jesus; it is walking in His footsteps and imitating Christ in every aspect of life. At baptism, we became sons and daughters of God, called to pattern our lives on His Son. A true disciple is not one who follows Jesus occasionally or merely to receive blessings, but one whose entire identity is rooted in being a child of God and a follower of Christ.

The Gospels show that large crowds often followed Jesus, many drawn by His reputation as a miracle worker. Yet Jesus made clear that not all who followed Him were true disciples. He began to set conditions: “If anyone comes to me without hating his father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple.” In other words, discipleship requires total commitment, putting Christ above everything else.

A disciple is someone under discipline, embracing the challenges of faith each day. Like an Olympic athlete who sacrifices daily for a crown that perishes, disciples accept the cost of following Christ for a reward that endures forever.

Saint Augustine once said that the three most essential things for the spiritual life are “humility, humility, humility.” To understand this, we must first distinguish between worldly humility and biblical humility.

Worldly humility is often thought of as downplaying one’s accomplishments or refusing honor. For example, if Walter Payton, one of the greatest football players, were to say he was “average,” people would call that humble. While this attitude captures a willingness not to draw attention to oneself, it is, nonetheless, inauthentic because it is contrary to the truth.

Biblical humility, by contrast, is rooted in the truth. Jesus himself is the perfect model of humility. Though he is God, he “emptied himself” and became human, obedient even to death on a cross (Philippians 2). His humility was not in denying who he is but in serving others through self-sacrificial love. Thus, true humility is not about belittling oneself, but about recognizing the radical truth: all that we are and all that we have come from God, and all of our gifts and talents are given for his glory and the good of others.

What made Michael Jordan the greatest basketball player of all time? He didn’t stumble into greatness. Rather, he worked relentlessly for it. Jordan was known as the first one on the court for practice and the last one to leave. Growing up, he lived basketball. His life was marked by discipline: he became a true disciple of the game.

The word “discipline” is not heard often today, but it is central to the Christian life. Discipline is not only self-control; it also comes from the loving correction of parents and from God Himself. Scripture reminds us: “My son, do not disdain the discipline of the Lord… for whom the Lord loves, he disciplines” (Heb 12:5–6). At the time discipline feels painful, but later it bears the “peaceful fruit of righteousness.”

Jesus warns us not to presume salvation: “Strive to enter through the narrow gate” (Lk 13:24). In His day, many presumed they would be saved simply because they were God’s chosen people. Likewise, we as Catholics may presume: I was baptized, and I haven’t killed anyone, so I must be fine. But salvation cannot be earned. It is a gift won by Christ’s suffering, death, and resurrection. Yet it requires our participation: to become disciples shaped by discipline.

We all get passionate about something. It might be the Cubs, our careers, or celebrity gossip just to name a few. But Jesus calls us to be on fire for Him. In Luke 12:49, He declares, “I have come to set the earth on fire, and how I wish it were already blazing! There is a baptism with which I must be baptized, and how great is my anguish until it is accomplished!” His “baptism” is his Passion, Death and Resurrection.

We look at our world and see violence, division, and death. Humanity has a problem. If someone offered a cure for death itself, wouldn’t you be excited? Jesus does exactly that. One challenge for us in appreciating what Jesus does for us is that we don’t properly understand death. A human is the unity of body and soul; death, a consequence of sin, is the tearing apart of a human, the separation of body and soul. When Jesus, in his humanity, rose from the dead, his human body and soul were reunited and transformed to live forever. He now offers a share in his new life, to all of us: we too can be resurrected to live forever in and with him.

Jesus promised to return. After His resurrection, He ascended into heaven, but not without assuring us that He would come again. The question is: what will He find when He returns? If Christ came today, what would He see in my life, and in yours?In today’s Gospel (Luke 12), Jesus speaks of a steward. This is a servant entrusted with the care of the household in the master’s absence. This word “steward” in Greek is oikonomos. It derives from from oikos (household) and nomos (law, rule). In the ancient world, a steward managed the daily life of a great estate, ensuring the needs of the household were met. He wasn’t the owner, but he bore responsibility for the well-being of all within. So too with us. Our lives are not our own. As today’s second reading from St. Paul reminds us, faith is not mere abstract belief. Faith is trust, as seen in Abraham who obeyed and journeyed with God. We have received new life in Christ, purchased at a price (1 Cor 6:19–20). Everything we have (our time, energy, even our bodies) belongs to Him.

Today’s readings remind us to strive to be rich in what truly matters: the things that matter to God. Money, possessions and status can easily consume our lives, but they do not satisfy the deepest hunger of the human heart. As St. Teresa of Calcutta once said, many suffer from a deep spiritual poverty: “You… have millions of people who suffer such terrible loneliness and emptiness… What they are missing, really, is a living relationship with God.”

Jesus addresses this reality in today’s Gospel from Luke. A man asks Him to settle an inheritance dispute, and Jesus refuses, warning instead about greed. He tells a parable of a rich man who stores up earthly wealth but neglects his soul. When the man dies, all his riches are meaningless. Jesus concludes, “Thus will it be for all who store up treasure for themselves but are not rich in what matters to God.”

So what are real riches? We might include love of God, love of neighbor, and holiness. These riches grow from a life rooted in prayer, the sacraments, and service. As St. Paul reminds us in today’s second reading, if we’re not living in and for Jesus, we will never be truly rich.

Many of us pray, and many of us are frustrated with prayer. Why? Because we treat it like a transaction: I ask, God gives. When He doesn’t give us that for which we ask, we wonder what’s wrong. Sometimes we become angry with God. But what if the problem isn’t with God, but with our understanding of prayer?

In this Sunday’s Gospel reading from Luke chapter eleven, Jesus’ disciples ask Him, “Lord, teach us to pray.” These were good, devout Jews. They already knew how to say prayers and ask God for things. But they saw something deeper in how Jesus prayed. The prayer practice of their teacher was rooted not in asking, but in relationship. As Jesus begins to teach them The Lord’s Prayer, one thing they notice immediately is that the Son of God begins His prayer with a declaration of love and reverence: “Father, hallowed be your name.”

When we hear the parable of the Good Samaritan, we often focus on its moral: be kind to others. But there’s much more beneath the surface. In Jesus’ day, one always went “up” to Jerusalem, even if the journey took you from north to south to get there. Regardless of elevation change or direction, one always went “up” to Jerusalem. The reason is that Jerusalem was where the temple was, and the temple was where God dwelt with his people. Thus, the man attacked by robbers, as well as the priest and the Levite, were all leaving Jerusalem and going “down” the road to Jericho.When the man was attacked, he was left for dead. According to the Old Testament, contact with the dead made a person ritually unclean. Priests and Levites, whose service centered around the temple, were bound by strict purity laws in order to serve at the temple (see Leviticus 21). Even though the priest and Levite in the story were going away from Jerusalem, probably done with their duties, they still avoided the man, walking on the opposite side of the road to be certain not to touch him. Maybe they feared ritual impurity. Perhaps they were unwilling to take the time for purification if he were dead.