Thursday of the Twenty-ninth Week of Ordinary Time

Lectionary: 476

Jesus said to his disciples:

"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!

Jesus' disciples can hardly imagine the "baptism" he anticipates with such eager longing. His sacrificial life and death challenge our ability and even our willingness to understand him, and yet they beckon us to go with him. His destiny shines like the morning star, very distant and often obscured by clouds and the haze of industry, but fascinating, beautiful and desirable.

As a non-Veteran chaplain in a Veteran's Hospital I have often heard warriors' stories. Some have killed men and would do it again if called upon. They were trained and commissioned to act in our name. They were good at it and they took pride in their work.

But I also know surgeons who approach the human body with scalpels and saws. I cringe just to look at these instruments.

I know a former cop who shot and killed people in the line of duty. It had to be done.

I grew up far from warfare, crime and hospitals. I have sometimes believed violence is unnecessary. I surely had no use for it. Nor did I see any point to martyrdom. "Can't we all just get along?" I wondered with Rodney King.

Jesus knew that life is never so sanguine. If most of us live far from the conflict zone between civility and chaos, it is still there and the threat is very real. Denying trouble invites it. 

Jesus knows what he is about and he suffers anguish until his baptism is accomplished. He has come to set the earth on fire; he wishes it were already ablaze. Like the surgeon, the cop and the warrior Jesus eagerly approaches his violent work and he calls us to go with him.

But, unlike the warrior's or surgeon's violence, his violence will be self-sacrifice. He will hand himself over to a brutal enemy who will torment, torture and kill him. He will suffer physical, emotional and spiritual abuse. And through it all he will watch for the love of his Father. Overwhelmed by an impenetrable darkness, even as his eyesight fades into fatal blindness, he will still wait for the light. Only on the third day, as his grief-stricken disciples and the world move on without him, as his body plunges toward corruption, will he know God's fidelity. Before that comes his defeat and humiliation must be complete, finished, consummated.

In today's gospel Jesus first tells us of his eagerness, and then invites us to practice that same, self-sacrificing violence:

From now on a household of five will be divided,

three against two and two against three;

a father will be divided against his son...

We may be disappointed and grief-stricken if our families, churches and communities are sorely divided, but we should not be surprised.

Community life was never supposed to be easy; human creatures are far too complex and intelligent to live together without ferocious disagreements. Threats are everywhere, peril is continuous and life-saving alternatives are endless. Of course we disagree, and our stubbornness is driven by fear! We're often so frightened we cannot look at the danger!

Jesus is most certainly our prince of peace but he is also a warrior; his weapon is the cross. His disciples also take up our crosses, especially those which teach us humility, patience, kindness and generosity. The enemy is neither Democrat nor Republican, atheist or Muslim, liberal, libertine nor conservative; the enemy is that self which will not submit to His cross.