Homily for Wednesday of the 31st Week in Ordinary Time

Many people struggle with today’s Gospel passage, especially about people needing to “hate” members of their family. Not only does this rub us the wrong way on a personal level, but it also seems to fly in the face of other things that Jesus has said, that the Scriptures have said, and that even the Ten Commandments have said: “Honor thy father and thy mother.” So, what is Jesus really saying here?

Well, Jesus is not really speaking about “hate” as we commonly understand it; He is saying that we must love Him and our heavenly Father even more than we love our own parents or our own family members. He is saying that when faced with a choice to follow Him or not, we must always choose Him, even when it involves a choice between Him and family.

It does sound harsh as Jesus said it in our Gospel passage, and sometimes Jesus harshly said things to get the attention of those who were listening to Him. But He wanted to acknowledge that, at times, following Him can be challenging and, at rarer times, put us at odds with even those we love most. We must be willing to choose Him over them.

Let us pray that our faith and trust in Jesus may be strong, even when following Him means taking up some painful crosses and burdens.