May Jesus Christ be praised and may his holy Mother pray for
us.
Today we celebrate World Mission Sunday. It is a day when the whole Church prays for
all of her members who are involved in the works of the missions. Often when we think about the activity of the
missionaries, we think of those brave apostolic souls who leave the comfort of
their homelands to proclaim the Gospel to a culture and a people who have yet to
hear the name of Jesus. We think of
those men and women who leave everything and serve as witnesses of the
compassion of Christ announcing the kingdom of God by their words and by their
lives. In our own parish community, we are
privileged with the presence of the Missionaries of the Poor, who by their vows
of poverty, chastity and obedience and through their apostolic service witness
to the kingdom of God. We are blessed,
brothers and sisters, that these signs of the kingdom live among us.
And yet, these Missionaries of the Poor are not the only ones
that Christ has sent to proclaim his gospel and witness to his kingdom. In the waters of baptism each of us was
called to be a child of God and each of us was sent to be a sign of his
love. When we pray for the missionaries,
we pray for the whole community of the baptized, and we pray for ourselves as
well.
Today in the Gospel we hear about the disposition of
discipleship and the ambition that the missionary must leave behind to follow
the Lord Jesus. James and John, the Sons
of Thunder, made a request of Jesus.
They asked for a seat at the right and the left of the Lord Jesus when
he entered into his glory. The Lord
responded with a question: “Can you drink the cup that I drink or be baptized
with the baptism with which I am baptized?”
When James and John agree, the Lord Jesus assures them that they will
share the cup and the baptism, but not the places at his right and his left. The Lord Jesus then addresses all of the disciples
and reminds them that being the greatest among the servants of Jesus means
being the servant of all.
It would be easy, dear brothers and sisters, to speak about
the virtue of humility and how we must be humble in our life of faith and in
our witness of faith. It is true that
humility is necessary for the disciple and the missionary; but the Lord Jesus
invites us to something more. The Lord
Jesus invites us to something more difficult today.
When the Lord asked James and John about sharing in his cup and
his baptism, the Lord was inviting them to join in his suffering. Union with Christ means sharing not only in
his teaching, in his miracles, in his prayer, it means also sharing in the
glory of his cross. The disciples and
the missionaries will suffer for their faith and suffer for their witness to
the faith. The father and the mother
will suffer in body and soul for the mission field of their family that God has
entrusted to their care. The student and
the teacher will suffer for their faith in the most difficult mission field of
the classroom. Wherever we work, we will
suffer for our faith and for our witness to faith as we seek to speak words of
charity in good times and in bad. Christ
Jesus has invited us to join him at his cross.
James and John asked for a place at his right and his left
when the Lord entered into his glory. It
would not be two disciples or two missionaries, but two robbers on a lonely
hill that would be at his right and his left when the Lord Jesus entered into
his glory.
Today as we renew our baptismal commitment as missionaries of
the Kingdom of heaven, we set aside our request for a special seat, and make
our prayer with the good thief, “Jesus, remember me, when you come into your
kingdom.”
Preached at Our lady of Lourdes Catholic Church, Monroe, NC
