6 July, 2025, 14th Sunday, Year C: Isaiah 66:10-14c; Galatians 6:14-18; Luke 10:1-12, 17-20
Isn’t what Jesus proposes in today’s Gospel contrary to our culture, even subversive?
Isn’t it significant that no one is sent out alone? A partner can challenge my strategy, just as I may help keep him or her on the mark. Wouldn’t bouncing things off a collaborator sharpen our understanding of our common mission? Couldn’t our mutual frictions even force us to discard stubbornness, to grow more flexible and responsive to the unexpected? This is not an exercise of rugged individualism aimed at individual achievement, is it?
What CEO would send out an employee with no provisions? Not a plane ticket, no hotel reservation, not a carry-on, not even a credit card! This is not the preparedness of consumerism. Isn’t Jesus demanding vulnerability, total dependence on others? Even trust. Of course, he comes from a culture that prized hospitality to the stranger, while we are shaped by a culture that safeguards our personal resources.
Mind you, Jesus is not asking us to become homeless, destitute or defenseless; indeed, he warns us to be aware, sending us like sheep among wolves. His instructions are provisional, not permanent. But am I otherwise blind to all that comes to me without asking? Have I traded my gratitude for a sense of entitlement? Have I lost sight of that direct channel to God’s goodness—and the courteous goodness of my neighbors and God’s other creatures to me?
Do not rejoice because the spirits are subject to you, but rejoice because your names are written in heaven, Jesus concludes. Doesn’t he question every sense of power, influence or prestige I might feel? Doesn’t he return my attention to what has been freely granted to me, what I could never earn?