29th Sunday in Ordinary Time - A Reflection by Fr. Leo

James and John make a blatant power grab in today’s gospel.  It’s almost embarrassing.  They want to sit to the right and left of Jesus in his new kingdom.  Joining in Jesus’ suffering is granted, but not the seats of “honor.”  The other disciples are really no better.  They become indignant.  Why, because they would have wanted the same.  So again Jesus teaches that greatness is serving others; it is giving one’s life for others just as he became the ransom for many..

If we find the passage embarrassing it is because we see it in the Church today and perhaps even in ourselves.  There is definitely a striving for power among many priests.  Even now some of the Cardinals want to challenge the Pope because their power is threatened and in some cases has already been taken away.  They are thinking in terms of preserving the Church as it was, rather than letting the Church be transformed into a vehicle of grace in the modern world.  It is about preserving a Church where they have authority over God’s will and against the sanctification of God’s people.  Jesus would say the same to some of our hierarchy today that he said to the disciples in today’s gospel.

But it’s not just them, it is sometimes the “good” christians who want to judge everyone else.  The clerk in Kentucky being a case in point.  She, who as been married four times, wants to stand in judgment of others created in the image of God.  Religion can become a self-righteous claw to grab for the seats next to Jesus. 

The corrective posture is that of the Psalmist today; “Lord, let your mercy be on us, as we place all our trust in you.”  It is Jesus who justifies.  It is Jesus who saves.  If we are good, it is not our doing, but the Lords.  We are the ones he died for so he could rob us of our crap!  And it is only in owning our need for God will we come to feel the freedom of his unconditional love.  The more we are unconditional in our love, the more we will feel God’s unconditional love for us.  Wise are we when we seek God’s wisdom through service of others.  It is then we will know the greatness of God.