Are We Couch or Cross Disciples?

Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am meek and humble of heart. (Matthew 11:29) Contrast it with the opening statement of our gospel passage for this 20th Sunday in Ordinary Time: “I have come to set the earth on fire, and how I wish it were already blazing! (Luke 12:49)

Or take “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give it to you. Do not let your hearts be troubled or afraid.” (John 14:27) And contrast it with this statement also from today’s gospel:^“Do you think that I have come to establish peace on the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division.” (Luke 12:51)

Will the real Jesus, please, stand up!

Jesus is truly meek and humble of heart. Jesus is the good shepherd who goes looking feverishly for his lost sheep and rejoices when he finds it again. But Jesus is also the One who cannot stand duplicity, aloofness and self-righteousness. Jesus is also the One sent to show the Father’s infinite love for humankind without a second thought about his personal cost for doing the Father’s will to the very end.

The only way to reconcile these seemingly contrasting statements is by realizing that being genuine disciples of Christ is the result of a radical choice that must be renewed, daily, and be marked by perseverance. It is a choice that, by its very attempt to be consistent with the teachings and the actions of Jesus, must burn like a raging fire, cut like a sharp sword and plunge one into the same baptism of anguish and pain that Jesus underwent.

To understand and to live out this difficult gospel passage without any softening agents added, I thought of the following terse, simple choice: we must choose between being “couch disciples” or “cross disciples.” I do not have to tell myself and you which type of disciples Jesus wants.

Couch disciples routinely, without any inner struggle or qualms, choose mediocrity, non-engagement and refuse to make any waves; they choose avoidance of confrontations, lukewarmness and the constant attempt to instinctively blend in with the amorphous mass of non-committed people.

Instead, cross disciples have etched in the back of their minds this phrase: “Yet I live, no longer I, but Christ lives in me; insofar as I now live in the flesh, I live by faith in the Son of God who has loved me and given himself up for me.” (Galatians 2:20)

For love of Jesus, they endure the fire that burns away their evil inclinations. For love of Jesus, they accept division, criticism, incomprehension, ridicule, persecution, ostracism even from close family members, because they dare to bear witness to Christ boldly, openly, without compromises. For love of Jesus, they embrace a prolonged baptism of pain with courage, perseverance and tenacity.

Thankfully, in our country, too, we have examples of cross disciples.

I am thinking of teachers who lose their jobs for not submitting to the insanity of wokeness.
I am thinking of police officers who find themselves frustrated and powerless to enforce the law or who get killed in the line of duty.
I am thinking of those who are ridiculed and even beaten up for bearing witness to the sacredness of life in front of abortion clinics.
I am thinking of doctors and nurses who refuse to maim children through gender affirming irreversible procedures.
I am thinking also of all those who are making these excruciating decisions quietly yet most resolutely, and are seen by God, for sure and, perhaps, by a few close friends.

By now, we understand the message that this difficult page of the Gospel is proposing to our reflection as an extreme challenge. The list is painfully long and shows how pressing the need for bolder, more courageous and generous cross disciples is. Across the world we had and have myriads of cross disciples who, literally, shed their blood for Christ.

We are getting also the idea that the peace which Christ, the Risen Lord, is offering to this world comes with a steep price to be paid by each cross disciple who welcomes the fire that Jesus had brought and plunges into the “baptism” of our Savior.

The 2nd reading (Hebrews 12:1-4) brings into sharper focus what Jesus proposes in the gospel passage. So, if upon careful reflection, we find out that we are couch disciples, this could be the last chance given us to prove our loyalty to Christ. However, if we can honestly say that we are decent cross disciples, we still must admit that in the struggle against sin we have not yet resisted to the point of shedding blood. (Hebrews 12:4)

Therefore, with the constant help of the Holy Spirit, we must intensify and deepen our love for Jesus, and persevere in our struggle to eradicate our flaws and any trace of indifference towards our neighbor, while joining other cross disciples to engage bravely the forces of evil which are all around us, until they are vanquished, even if that might require the shedding of our blood!