THE CROSS OF THE PRIESTLY MINISTRY


WEDNESDAY, THIRTY FIRST WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME

Phil 2:12-12; Ps 27:1,4,13-14; Lk 14:25-33

Condition for God working in us

We described the knowledge of ourselves in the light of our faith in Jesus Christ as the starting mark for our journey into Jesus Christ, as the commencement of our ministry as priests. We gain this knowledge of self in contrast with the knowledge of God’s greatness we acquire through our faith in Jesus Christ. Given this spiritual insight, we gain a knowledge of God’s greatness and our nothingness. This knowledge corresponds to the commandment to love God with all our minds, hearts, and strength. Subsequently, the love we give to ourselves is proportionate to our knowledge of ourselves as nothing before God. With the knowledge and love in our minds and hearts, respectively, we are made instruments in the hand of God to accomplish his good purposes. In this sense, Paul describes our journey into Christ as working out our salvation in fear and trembling. It is a salutary fear before God’s majesty seen through the eyes of our mind. He is the goal we must attain. To please God, who knows us, we must act in complete harmony with his will. God makes his Holy Spirit present to us for this purpose. He inspires all our actions. “It is God, for his own loving purpose, who puts both the will and the action into you.”

This continuous inspiration from the indwelling Spirit of God makes our actions priestly actions, for they are expressions of God’s holy will. To ensure that the actions are also love-motivated, Paul added that we must own them by doing them joyfully. “Do all that has to be done without complaining or arguing and then you will be innocent and genuine, perfect children of God among a deceitful and underhand brood, and you will shine in the world like bright stars because you are offering it the word of life.” The priestly ministry is to give holy things to the people, the word of God is the sacred thing to give to anyone. The offering of the word of God to humanity is the ministry of Jesus Christ. Hence, Paul sees the activity as the perfection of their Christian vocation, to which he would be willing and joyful to add the offering of his blood or life. Any of us who has attained such harmony with the will of God can say with the Psalmist: “The Lord is my light and my help; whom shall I fear? The Lord is the stronghold of my life; before whom shall I shrink?”

The gospel contains the same doctrine. Our Lord Jesus Christ describes the person who leaves everything to follow him as his disciple. “Great crowds accompanied Jesus on his way and he turned and spoke to them. ‘If any man comes to me without hating his father, mother, wife, children, brothers, sisters, yes and his own life too, he cannot be my disciple. Anyone who does not carry his cross and come after me cannot be my disciple.’” What happened to our Lord's injunction to love our neighbour as ourselves? Is there a contradiction in his teaching? There is certainly no contradiction. As we have explained above, the love of self does not come before the love of God, which must be total and complete. Given the first and greatest commandment, the love of self is derived love from our knowledge and love of God. From the gospel episode, the interest and joy of the Lord is not in the great multitude of people following him but in those who undertake the spiritual journey into his mystery. Because it involves passing through the narrow path, he cautions us to sit down every day and meditate on what is required of us to make a successful journey to Jesus Christ.  

Let us pray: Grant us, Lord, the grace to understand the demands of our Christian vocation, through daily and consistent meditation on your word, that imbued with the knowledge of your sublime greatness and your unfathomable love for us, we may wholeheartedly commit ourselves to our priestly vocation. 

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