Jr 18:1-12 & Lk 14:25-33

5 September 2004

“A Little Bit of Extremism”

            I’ll start off with a little humor.  Two guys go into a bar.  They sit down and start watching the television.  A news reporter is interviewing a particular person, someone known to be an extreme zealot, who likes to promote fanatical views.  So one guy turns to the other and says, “Every single extremist should be lined up against a wall and shot!”  (I did say it was “a little humor.”)

            That isn’t completely unrelated to my sermon topic.  Extremism is something that’s always been with us.  It’s something in all of us, in one way or another.  It takes a lot of forms.  It may be of the relatively harmless variety, such as doggedly insisting that it really makes a difference whether one drinks Coke or Pepsi.  Or it may be excessively violent, such as the current fad among certain terrorists of beheading people.

            Sometimes extremism is seen in how groups take on new members.  For example, the so-called Lord’s Army, a bunch of thugs in northern Uganda who terrorize the population.  They’re notorious for seizing children and forcing them to serve as soldiers.  One of their favorite tactics is making the kids (usually boys and often after forcing them to take drugs) kill a family member or someone else in their home village—the idea being that the boy will feel that there’s no way to turn back.

            In this country, I understand that some criminal gangs will make a similar demand:  commit a felony, kill somebody.  That’s proof that the would-be member is serious about it.

            Of course, there are nonviolent ways to test the sincerity of applicants.  Some of them are found within the Christian tradition.  Interaction with the Benedictine monastery in Erie has made Banu and me somewhat familiar with the Rule of Benedict, which is the 1500 year old booklet that helps guide their life together.  Chapter 58 of the Rule, entitled “The Procedure for Receiving Members,” does not seem to lay out a method that many churches would be eager to imitate.

“Do not grant newcomers to the monastic life an easy entry,” it begins, “but, as the apostle says, ‘Test the spirits to see if they are from God (1 Jn 4:1).’  Therefore, if someone comes and keeps knocking at the door, and if at the end of four or five days s/he has shown herself/himself patient in bearing [the] harsh treatment and difficulty of entry, and has persisted in [the] request, then s/he should be allowed to enter and stay in the guest quarters for a few days.”

            Today, entry into the monastic life lacks the severity it had in the sixth century, in St. Benedict’s time.  At least, I don’t recall ever seeing, during my visits to the monastery in Erie, any candidates being forced to stand outside day and night, in rain and snow, for days on end!  If the letter of the Rule of Benedict isn’t always followed, its spirit still is.  While the sisters there are very kind and hospitable to visitors, they don’t fall all over themselves to bring in new members.  During times of declining membership, that would be a real temptation.

            It seems they’ve taken a lesson from Jesus in today’s gospel reading.  He says that being his disciple calls one to “hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and even life itself” (v. 26).  Now there’s a little bit of extremism!

            Some people explain this language of hating that Jesus uses as the typical Middle Eastern flair for embellishment, for poetic license.  It’s less “emotional animosity” than it is a sense of “rejecting.”  As if that makes it any easier!  In his gospel, Matthew softens the blow by having Jesus say, “Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me” (10:37).  It’s not like Jesus has suddenly forgotten the Fifth Commandment.  (You know, the one about honoring father and mother…)

            The problem is that Jesus keeps pouring it on.  He says that his disciples must carry the cross.  He uses certain word pictures.  Jesus speaks of someone building a tower—making sure that he has enough resources to finish the job.  He speaks of a king going to war—making sure that he has enough troops to finish the job.  By the way, it’s quite possible that Jesus is referring to current events, things that would really resonate with the people.

            And then, as if all that weren’t enough, here’s his summation in verse 33:  “So therefore, none of you can become my disciple if you do not give up all your possessions.”  You know, it’s almost like he wants to drive everyone away!

            It’s not as if there aren’t plenty of people hanging on to his every word.  Look at the way the passage starts.  Verse 25 says, “Now large crowds were traveling with him.”  Jesus has achieved a great deal of celebrity.  Things are really taking off—folks in the public relations department are high fiving each other.  Jesus is Mr. Popularity; he’s the flavor of the month!

            It’s entirely likely that he’s bugged by that very thing.  He’s not interested in the fickle adoration of the mob.  He wants to make it very clear what it means to follow him.  Thus, the extreme, even shocking language.

            Still, Jesus is doing more than just trying to weed out the insincere.  This business of hating the family, of rejecting the family, strikes a blow at an unjust situation in their culture.[1]  Actually, it’s been true in many cultures.  It is that one’s social standing is tied to one’s relatives, especially to one’s parents.  For orphans and widows, that’s a real problem.  They have neither parents nor husbands in this web of social connection.  In this kind of society, they’re left defenseless, and they get treated very badly.

            In our own culture, we hear a lot about so-called “family values.”  Well, Jesus has his own ideas about the family—and they don’t always match up very nicely with our ideas.  Earlier in Luke, when told that his family is waiting to see him, Jesus replies, "My mother and my brothers are those who hear the word of God and do it" (8:21).  He seems to think that faith, not accident of birth, is a better determination of family ties.

            It’s important to understand something here.  Jesus isn’t telling the people to give up the bad things in their lives.  That, as the phrase goes, is a “no-brainer.”  Instead, he’s saying that being his disciple means we give up the good things in our lives.  Again, that extreme language—“hating life itself,” “give up all your possessions”—that encompasses everything.

            Jesus is talking about the spiritual quality known as “detachment.”  On the matter of detachment, Thomas Merton says, “Everything you love for its own sake, outside of God alone, blinds your intellect and destroys your judgment…It [corrupts] your choices so that you cannot clearly distinguish good from evil and you do not truly know God’s will.”[2]

            At first glance, this business of detachment may sound like a hands-off, remote, indifferent approach to things.  It may sound like the realm of the pious.  But for those who love God—and for those who want to love God—those things are not true.  Detachment means loving someone or something as it is, and not making more of it than it really is.  (Does that make sense?  Is it clear as mud?)

            There are a number of sayings of Jesus in the New Testament that are sometimes called “hard sayings.”  Those are the ones that, more than just being a tall order, seem absolutely impossible, maybe even insane.  I think I’m safe in concluding that today’s gospel reading qualifies as a “hard saying.”

            Merton seems to agree.  When we consider what it really means to be a disciple of Jesus, a mature Christian, “we remain [appalled] at our own weakness, our own poverty, our evasions, our infidelity, our hesitancy.  Our very weakness clouds our vision.  We are left helpless, knowing very well that we are asked to give up everything, yet not knowing how or where to begin.  In such a condition there is no use in forcing the issue.  Great patience and humility are needed, and humble prayer for light, courage and strength.”[3]

            In our Old Testament reading, Jeremiah finds, in a visit to the local potter, a bit of wisdom that seems appropriate here.  He watches how the potter works with clay in creating various objects.  If something goes wrong, he takes the clay and starts over.  The analogy with God and the people is clear.  God is the potter.  If the people are unwilling to be the clay for the potter, then the potter must start over.

            Verse 12 is not optimistic.  We can see Jeremiah asking, “Is that your final answer?”  The reply to him:  “It’s no use!  We can’t change, and we’re not really sure that we want to.”  This kind of resistance to change has a lot to do with our resistance to detachment.  Remember what Thomas Merton says:  “Our very weakness clouds our vision.”  A voice within us—a voice whispering to us—says, “It’s easier to just give up!”

Some people have been told by others, using these exact words:  “You can’t change.”  Of course, that’s a lie.  If it were true, that would mean God lacks the power to reshape us.  It would mean that we lack the free will to cooperate with the potter.

Still, have you ever felt that way?  Have you ever listened to the voice that says, “It’s easier to make excuses?”  Nonetheless, bear in mind that when we hear this voice over and over again, there is really no use in forcing the issue of change.  That’s the way to a blessed extremism.  What is needed is patience and humility—humble prayer for light, courage, and strength.

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