15th Sunday Worship and Discipleship: one and the same

Discipleship has been the focus in the Gospels and the homily for the past couple of weeks. This part of Luke’s Gospel teaches us about Discipleship. Discipleship means to follow Christ, follow in his way, as to experience the Salvation he gave to us and also to fulfill our mission as believers.  Discipleship takes place at all kinds of levels, and happens in all kinds of different contexts: whether we are married, single or celibate; man or female, children, teens, young adults, or full blown adults and beyond; religious or lay, whatever culture we belong to, etc.

Discipleship also has a solid core, a foundation from which it derives from and what it attains to. That foundation formed by commitment, adaptability, and humility. As we grow and are formed as Catholics we move to a deeper level of discipleship, at least that is the ideal.

We know sometimes we simply stop growing as disciples; whether by choice or by ignorance or sometimes we are never guided well. What happens? And what is that deepest level of discipleship, of following Christ?

The parable of the Good Samaritan is often preached as a moral imperative to treat other people well. That has a truth to it, but there is something much deeper that Luke wants us to know.  The parable sits in those same passages we have been hearing about discipleship. So this is more than how we act.  We know this story; a man going down from Jerusalem to Jericho is robbed and left for dead. We are told a priest and a Levite were going down the same path and did nothing, even though they saw him. The context is that these men had just completed their religious observance, in fact their duty at Temple. They had performed their worship and were returning home to Jericho where many such persons lived. Yet, despite that they had just worshiped God in the Temple, despite doing their duty to God they did nothing to help this man.

It was the lowly samaritan, unable and unwilling to worship in the Temple who did help.

Think back to John’s Gospel, Jesus meets the Samaritan woman at the well. He told her that there would come the day when people would neither worship God in the Temple nor in the Samaritan temple, but in Spirit and Truth.

The Spirit and Truth of Discipleship is that our worship will change us to see people in need and want to help them. True Disciples not only worship and “Do” their duty at Church, or in a “holy” place, but also with joy do good in this world. There is no distinction, one feeds the other. Worship and doing good, for the true disciples, are equal.

We can come to Mass each week, go home, and never be changed.  We are disciples, yes, but we can be more so.  We can go and be doing good things in this world, and never be part of a church or religious community; we are disciples, but we can be more so.

Jesus teaches us a holistic approach: worship and our attitude towards others and the needs of others are one in the same. A deep faith and an alive faith is when we come each week to give God Glory with the community and then fed we go and give God Glory by how we forgive, how we listen, how we give, how we care, how we surrender…

Several months ago Bishop Mueggenborg outlined the plans for the Eucharistic Renewal he wanted to implement in the diocese. He really wants people to grasp that the person of Christ truly is present in the Bread and Wine that become his Body and Blood.  A certain priest raised the matter to the Bishop that there has to be more; it can’t be simply about affirming our dogma. The priest said he knew people who truly and wholly believed in the real presence and were jerks, but that was not the word he used, in their dealings with others.

Belief must open us to transformation, to true discipleship.  It is a journey though. A journey of a community and as persons.  Some of us are far along on this journey, some of us are just starting, and maybe some of us have stopped.  

What happens if we re-start or continue on? Jesus also shows us.  Life. Healing. His very death on the cross and resurrection was his act of worship to the Father. He saw the need and he knew what he had to do, and the Father says LIVE.

Our worship is our giving ourselves to the Father as well, letting the grace transform our lives, our minds, our hearts, our homes, our schools, our workplace, our community, our world.  At times we need to take a tough look at ourselves and our actions. Examining our conscience, our lives and how we truly act towards others. The Catholic saying is that the worst sins happens in the church parking lot right after mass.

The major part of the work of the parish is to help all of us become better and better discipleships, and that includes me as priest-pastor. That means all of us will need to challenged where we are in the faith and to be invited to go deeper.  There are too many people hurting, too many suffering in our community. We can make a difference as those disciples of Jesus Christ.