14th Sunday of Ordinary Time, Year C

          Our Lord Jesus, in today’s Gospel of Luke Chapter 10, sends the 72 disciples, henceforward known too as apostles, apostolos in Greek meaning the sent.  He instructs them how to comport themselves in this mission.  As He sent the 72, so now, He sends us also, being ourselves accounted for among the 72 disciples-apostles, by virtue of our Baptism, completed by Confirmation and Eucharist as we are welcomed into Christianity.  He tells them and even now He tells us: Carry no purse, no bag, no sandals; (We trust in His Providence and only in Him to the point that we leave our comfort zones in testifying and preaching the message of Jesus.) and greet no one on the road.  (There is urgency in our mission and there is no room for procrastination for if we be saved let us be saved now and not tomorrow, for tomorrow might not come.)  Whatever house you enter, first say, 'Peace to this house!'  And if anyone is there who shares in peace, your peace will rest on that person; but if not, it will return to you.  (The peace of Christ is what we bring, the true peace which may not bring outright absence of problems but the true solutions to the problems we face every day and the true answers to the innermost longings and yearnings we have.)  Remain in the same house, eating and drinking whatever they provide, for the laborer deserves to be paid. Do not move about from house to house.  Whenever you enter a town and its people welcome you; eat what is set before you; cure the sick who are there, and say to them, 'The kingdom of God has come near to you.'  (In our service to the message of Christ, He Himself will take care of us, both our material and spiritual needs.  When we work, He whom we work for will certainly not neglect our needs.)  But whenever you enter a town and they do not welcome you, go out into its streets and say, 'Even the dust of your town that clings to our feet, we wipe off in protest against you. Yet know this: the kingdom of God has come near.'  I tell you, on that day it will be more tolerable for Sodom than for that town.  Saint Augustine tells us that God who freely created us will not save us without us freely participating in His divine plan for us.  There is freedom in our Catholic Christian religion, for, also, we know by our bi-millenarian experience that freedom achieves where force fails and ultimately backfires.  God loves us unconditionally, but if we refuse Him His authentic Love, He will never force us to love Him, for there is no place for constriction and conscription in love.  When love is not free, it is not love.  Love in bondage is servitude, while God looks upon us as children He would die for and not us servants, cowering in fear of Him.  He looks upon you and me as daughters and sons.

Our message is the Cross.  There is no other message than our proclamation of the Love of Christ Jesus to all of us when He gave His life on the Cross for those who were present during His time, and He gave His life once and for all, not only for those present but also for those since the beginning of time and for us now living, and for those to come after us.  Saint Paul reminds us today in his letter to the Galatians Chapter 6): May I never boast of anything except the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.

This message of the Cross may be in Love’s sacrifice but it ultimately gives us the true joy.  It might not give us immediate happiness as would money, power and fame.  The Cross of Love offers us lasting joy, true happiness that is not fleeting but eternal.  The Prophet Isaiah declares to us without hesitation in his book Chapter 66: You shall see, and your heart shall rejoice; your bodies shall flourish like the grass; and it shall be known that the hand of the Lord is with her servants.

My dear sisters and brothers, we are sent, we are apostles.  Our message is the Cross; our message is Love; our message is Joy.  We start now.  We start here.  We start today.  Amen.