Word of the Week

23nd Sunday in Ordinary Time

Count: Psephizo (Gk.): meaning, “to count with pebbles, to compute, calculate, reckon”. Underlining this term is a calculation by vote.

In catechetical terms, the word cost is typically coupled with the price of discipleship. This entails a degree of separation from ties that are dear to us. The CCC states: “Christ is the center of all Christian life. The bond with him takes precedence over all other bonds, familial or social” (CCC 1618; cf. 2544). Included in this detachment from persons is our connectedness to worldly goods. Essentially, out of our poverty, will we discover the Kingdom of God (cf. 2544).

This particular Greek word, psephizo, is found in Luke’s account on Christ’s teaching on the cost of discipleship (cf. Lk.14:28) and John’s address to the number 666 (Rev.13:18).  In the case of Luke’s account on the cost of discipleship, there is an essential piece in understanding the larger picture of Christ’s charge to follow him at all costs, and it is found in the word “hate” (Lk.14:26). In the teaching of Christ to ‘hate’ our immediate family, he is addressing the need to “love less” (this is what the Gk. Terms ‘hate’ actually means) our earthly relationships to that of our relationship with God (Hahn and Minch, 136). Consequently, our commitment to Christ must prevail over any and all communal relationships, which includes “father…mother…wife…children…brothers…sisters… and even ourselves” (Lk.14:26). This love is paradoxical, because it is in the ‘hating’ our family that we are actually loving our family. In other words, by loving Christ first, we love our family according to God’s design. In the end, what Christ calls for is an absolute dependence upon God for all things, in both material and spiritual realities, that we would discover God’s will for our life.

It is worth noting, by way of the passage from the book of Revelation and the number 666 (number tied to the sign of the beast), that there is a connection to Christ’s exhortation to weigh our relationship with him over all others; a pertinence that is found within the context of the passage from Revelation. John, the author of Revelation, goes back to the figure of Solomon and the business of him counting the denaris that he was profiting from in his over-taxing the people in the kingdom of David. He was taxing the people 666 denaris.  Essentially, Solomon, taking the wisdom he had received from God, sought to take advantage of the Israelites by coming up with ways to create revenue in an unjust manner. For all intents of purposes, this was, and is, the sign of the beast: to take what God has freely given to us and use it for our gain and selfish purposes. That being said, we are called to despise any unjust earthly profit, and not be busy about “computing” wealth for our earthly prosperity.

Over the course of these weekly bulletins, we have touched upon the importance of understanding the call to be detached from material things so to be attached to spiritual realities. In doing so, we have taken up the question of riches and its relevance to the Kingdom of God. This Twenty-Third Sunday in Ordinary Time continues to reinforce this overarching relationship that exists between faith and money; a relationship that can be found on almost every page in the synoptic gospels. As readers of Scripture, we are called to have an understanding of the historical context from which Christ was here on earth to better understand the fuller sense of Scripture and the events and truths they record. Consequently, to understand the economical infrastructure of Christ’s time on earth is to see the importance of money and its seductive power over people (this has never changed). One can well imagine the reasons why Christ used the rhetoric that surrounds wealth in his teachings on spirituality. What was Christ doing? Quite simply, using a common vantage point to bring about a deeper understanding of a new vantage point from which to see the world, a prism rooted in being sons in the Son, one directed towards holiness.

“In order to live for Christ and no longer for ourselves, to collaborate in the ministry of reconciliation, to build the Kingdom of God, we must bear the Cross and follow Jesus. Let us not be afraid to be sings of contradiction. Let us embrace the Cross, confident that it is a ‘tree of eternal life’, trusting in the firm promise of the Resurrection.”

--John Paul II

Primary Texts Consulted

•  Catholic Bible. Suggested trans. Revised Standard Version, Catholic Edition.
•  Catechism of the Catholic Church, 2nd Edition, 1997.
• Hahn, Scott and Minch, Curtis. Ignatius Catholic Study Bible: New Testament, RSV, 2nd ed. San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2010.

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