Fighting with (and for) Your Family

Oct 24: Thursday of the Twenty-ninth Week in Ordinary Time

I remember a priest mentioning this scene from The Office in a homily about today’s Gospel. His point as that fighting doesn’t mean ending things. Some things are worth fighting for.

Reading 1

Eph 3:14-21

Brothers and sisters: I kneel before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, that he may grant you in accord with the riches of his glory to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in the inner self, and that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; that you, rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the holy ones what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, so that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.

Now to him who is able to accomplish far more than all we ask or imagine, by the power at work within us, to him be glory in the Church and in Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever.  Amen.

That first line is a play on words, in Greek. Patēr means “father,” but it’s usually reserved for the father of the gods (Zeus), which the early Christians then applied to God the Father; the word for family is patria. And so Paul is doing a little home-spun etymology, saying every family is named for our Father in heaven.

Paul wants us to know we are children of God. He wants us to know the love of Christ beyond simple knowledge, but be filled with His love. That love, he prays, will overflow into the rest of our life.
 

Responsorial Psalm

Ps 33:1-2, 4-5, 11-12, 18-19

R. (5b) The earth is full of the goodness of the Lord.
Exult, you just, in the LORD;
praise from the upright is fitting.
Give thanks to the LORD on the harp;
with the ten-stringed lyre chant his praises.
R. The earth is full of the goodness of the Lord.
For upright is the word of the LORD,
and all his works are trustworthy.
He loves justice and right;
of the kindness of the LORD the earth is full.
R. The earth is full of the goodness of the Lord.
But the plan of the LORD stands forever;
the design of his heart, through all generations.
Blessed the nation whose God is the LORD,
the people he has chosen for his own inheritance.
R. The earth is full of the goodness of the Lord.
But see, the eyes of the LORD are upon those who fear him,
upon those who hope for his kindness,
To deliver them from death
and preserve them in spite of  famine.
R. The earth is full of the goodness of the Lord.

God’s plan is long term. Short-term pain will be forgotten eventually. When faced with tough decisions, we have to think about eternity, which is not always easy to wrap our heads around.

Family is a good thing, and we should always love our family. But as Jesus discusses in the Gospel, it’s not the ultimate thing. If we face division between our loved ones, we have to have faith that God’s long-term plan, “through all generations,” will work out to the good.

Alleluia

Phil 3:8-9

R. Alleluia, alleluia.
I consider all things so much rubbish
that I may gain Christ and be found in him.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.

We should throw away anything we don’t need, which isn’t always easy.

Gospel

Lk 12:49-53

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! Do you think that I have come to establish peace on the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division. 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 and a son against his father, a mother against her daughter and a daughter against her mother, a mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law."

Metaphors aren’t perfect. Jesus doesn’t want to run around with a flaming sword.

Swords were the sharpest things known at the time. They were very serious business. A sword can finely and definitively divide things—right from wrong, truth from falsehood.

There are some things that can’t be compromised. Remember that tolerance isn’t a Christian virtue, at least not with regard to good and evil.

Jesus uses strong language, but he’s using language we can understand. If we stick to Jesus, the Way, the Truth, and the Life, that will put us in conflict with others. We need to be prepared for that.

We shouldn’t trade Jesus for “peace,” because that kind of compromised peace will not last. It’s a bad deal.