Defeating Earth’s Conquering King

Great crowds were traveling with Jesus,
and he turned and addressed them,
“If anyone comes to me without hating his father and mother,
wife and children, brothers and sisters,
and even his own life,
he cannot be my disciple.
Whoever does not carry his own cross and come after me
cannot be my disciple.
Which of you wishing to construct a tower
does not first sit down and calculate the cost
to see if there is enough for its completion?
Otherwise, after laying the foundation
and finding himself unable to finish the work
the onlookers should laugh at him and say,
‘This one began to build but did not have the resources to finish.’
Or what king marching into battle would not first sit down
and decide whether with ten thousand troops
he can successfully oppose another king
advancing upon him with twenty thousand troops?
But if not, while he is still far away,
he will send a delegation to ask for peace terms.
In the same way,
anyone of you who does not renounce all his possessions
cannot be my disciple.”
Luke14:25-33

Usually at Mass I do not read along with the lectors and the priest as they do the daily readings from the lectionary. Being a trained lector myself I know that the readings are meant to be heard and contemplated together by the congregation and not read by everyone individually. But today we had a visiting African priest – and the acoustics in our church and my particular type of mild hearing loss from years of standing near a high powered outboard motor made it impossible to understand what he was reading. Afterward at the end of his homily he told an obviously very funny story about someone having an audience with the Pope. Most of the parishioners laughed very heartily at the punch line, spoken by the Pontiff as quoted by our cheerful celebrant in his heavily accented voice echoing through the sanctuary — but all I had gotten were the few details I share here.

I also recognized the Gospel passage he had read, but I didn’t quite remember all the details. So I looked it up in the missalette. And I had an epiphany. Who is the king approaching us who will vanquish us despite all our riches and power and supporting network of family and friends who we should make peace with “while he is still far away …”?

And the answer was obvious. That king is Lord Death — the one who conquers all on Earth in the end. Not our friends, our family, our accomplishments nor our possessions jointly or severally can preserve for us our individual “kingdoms” against the ravishes of this vanquishing warrior monarch.

Taken this way, this passage is Zen-like. If we agree with Death that he wins now — that all of the things that I have been convinced by this culture and my own passions are mine to have and to hold — even my own life — are already the conquered spoils of war — choosing instead to give my life and the fate of all that makes it up into the Hands of He Who Vanquishes Death Itself — well — I have surrendered before the battle occurred — but the War is indeed Won.