Isaiah 66:10-14c
Gal 6:14-18
Lk 10:1-12, 17-20

Bishop Untener’s Homily

What is particularly significant in this Gospel passage is that Jesus appointed others besides the twelve. These were to be his disciples too. They represent all of us. We aren’t members of "the twelve." But we’re disciples. That’s what baptism is – a ritual by which we become disciples of Jesus.

Jesus speaks to these "others" and tells them that being a disciple won’t always be easy. Again, he’s talking about us. He’s talking to us.

I’d like to get us thinking about what it means to be a disciple of the Lord. Here’s a way of doing that.

Imagine that someone who didn’t belong to any religion decided that they would like to become members of the Catholic Church. So they came to you or to me and asked, "What does it mean for me if I become a member? What do I have to do? What do I have to stop doing? What’s different about it?" The first sort of things we might think of could be, "Well, you have to go to Mass on Sunday, and there are rules about getting married ..." But they would interrupt and say, "Well, apart from those kinds of things, what’s different about the way I live my life day in and day out? I’ve been a decent person. Do I have to do something different than be a decent person to be part of this group?"

To answer that question, we’d have to start with something that is far deeper than keeping Church rules ... far deeper than simply our external behavior. We’d have to say something like this:

"Well, you see, we believe that God is more than an abstract God. We believe that God is very personal and that God loves us. We believe that Jesus is God, and that Jesus is an expression of God’s love for us. Through Jesus, God became part of this world and part of this human race. Jesus calls us His brothers and sisters. You have to understand, Jesus is still alive. He loves us, he really does. Right now. He loves us completely, unconditionally, and very personally."

"That love has an effect on us. You know how, in many legends and folk tales, there is the story of a prince who comes upon a young peasant woman who has no money, is wearing a raggedy dress, and doesn’t think much of herself – because nobody else does. In these stories, the prince falls in love with the peasant, and it has an effect on her. She has never felt loved this way before. She suddenly feels that she is worth something. She is transformed. Her face begins to shine with a certain radiance. She walks differently, acts differently. All because she is loved ... loved for who she is. She was a nobody, and now she is somebody worthwhile."

"You see ... we believe that Jesus loves us that way. And Jesus is God, so God loves us that way. It transforms us. God’s own love runs through our whole body, our soul, our spirit. God’s own live shines through me, and shines upon the world around me, and the people around me. We act differently."

"For example, the way we treat this world. We believe that all creation belongs to God. And so we love it too. It’s not a throw-away world, like a MacDonald’s wrapper. This is God’s world. God created it and saw that it was good. God gave it a destiny and Jesus became part of this world to take it to its destiny. So we try to make it a better place, and we try to make sure that we share the goods of this world with others, because it all belongs to God."

"More than that, we see human life differently. It’s different because Jesus became a human being, and lifted all of us to be daughters and sons of God. We believe that all human beings (whether they know it or not) have God’s life in them. And so our attitude toward people – whether they’re good or bad – is always loving. And we try to do to them what Jesus did for us. We try to love even our enemies, hoping it will change them. Even if it doesn’t seem to work right away, we keep doing it. We do it to everyone. We let God’s love shine through us towards them, whether they’re an old person with Alzheimer’s, or a child in its mother’s womb."

"So, what you have to do if you are a disciple of the Lord is believe that, and live that. We aren’t sent into towns and villages like the earliest disciples were. We’re sent into the situations of our own life to live that way. And we believe that it has an effect, even when we can’t see it. Because it is God’s love that is shining through us, and God’s love always has an effect, even if it is hidden from our eyes."

"So ... we come together on Sundays to gather with the Lord at his own supper table and in those moments we experience His love for each of us and all of us. We place ourselves with him on the altar and give ourselves in total love to God, as he did even in the face of suffering and death. At Communion, we receive the Lord Himself under the form of bread and wine. He embraces us with His love, surrounds us with His love. When we leave, we go out like those 72 disciples and we live that love. We let it transform our way of thinking, our way of acting. We act differently because of it. To put it very simply, we do our part to change the world by letting that love shine through us upon this world and the people in it."

That’s what we could say to a person who asks us what it means to be part of this group we call the Church. That’s what we believe. That’s why we’re disciples of Our Lord.

And then we’d say to the person, "What a way to live. Come and join us and be part of this wonderful work of changing the face of the earth. What a way to live."

Originally given on July 8, 2001