Homilies
Reordered Love
Holy Spirit take my words and speak to each of us according to our need.
“Whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, even life itself, cannot be my disciple.”
It feels shocking, almost offensive. How can the one who tells us to love our neighbour, to honour our parents, even to love our enemies, suddenly speak of hating those closest to us?
This is one of those passages where, if we’re honest, we’d rather skip to something gentler. But it is here for a reason, and perhaps especially for us today. Because Jesus is not calling us to hatred as we usually understand it. He’s calling us to reordered love.
In Jesus’ world, the word “hate” could also mean something like “love less than” or “set aside in comparison to something greater.” It’s a way of saying, “If you want to follow me, I must come first, even before your family, even before your own life.”
We find the same idea in Matthew’s Gospel, but phrased less brutally: “Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me.”
So, this isn’t actually about despising family or life. It’s about radical loyalty. It’s about deciding what, or who, is at the very centre of our lives.
The great theologian, St. Augustine spoke of the ordo amoris; the “order of loves.” When we love God first, then every other love; family, neighbour, community, ourselves finds its right place.
Now, what does this mean for us, in a world which albeit changing, we still generally treasure family, community, and life?
It means that discipleship involves hard choices. Sometimes the values of Christ will clash with the values of family, or culture, or nation. Following Jesus may put us at odds with what others do and may in turn, expect of us.
But here is the paradox: when God comes first, our love for others is not diminished but purified. It is no longer based on fear or rejection, control, or convenience. It becomes freer, deeper, and more ultimately more generous and authentic.
With regard to our families, this passage reminds us that no one person can be the ultimate source of our identity. Parents, children, spouses, siblings; these may influence and shape us but they are not God.
Putting God first might mean being patient with a difficult relative, when everything in us wants to snap back. It might mean forgiving someone or something when everyone else tells us to cut ties and walk away. It might mean supporting someone whose choices or identity are different from what we expected, because we remember that our call is not to possess them but to love them as God loves them.
When God is our first love, we don’t love our families less we love them more truly.
In the community within our Ministry Area, this teaching calls us to be a family beyond blood relations.
We are to be a household of God where everyone has a place; single people, widows, those estranged from relatives, those who have never found a family that accepts them, those classed as ‘other’, the troublemakers, those who are ‘too much’, those who push boundaries and challenge our patience.
It means being a church where race, language, gender, and sexuality are not barriers but invitations to deeper love. To love Christ first is to see Christ in each person, even when they differ from us, even when they make us uncomfortable. When someone walks in who doesn’t look or sound like us, our loyalty to Christ calls us to welcome them with open arms. When someone’s life doesn’t fit our own standards because of their sexuality, gender identity, or culture. Our loyalty to Christ calls us to listen, to learn, to walk alongside them in love. When divisions of politics or class threaten to fracture us, our loyalty to Christ calls us back to the table where he feeds us as one body.
To love God first is to refuse to let anything—prejudice, fear, or difference get in the way of loving the neighbour God has set before us. Even if our argument is that they are doing something we think is against God’s teachings, it is not our job to judge. It is our calling as followers of Jesus, to love them first.
If we are all created in the image of God, and if God doesn’t make mistakes, then you will never look into the eyes of someone that God doesn’t love.
Beyond this town, this MA, this county, this country even, across the world we share with people of many faiths and of none, this passage challenges us to live with courage and generosity.
If we cling too tightly to life, with all its comfort, its safety, and its privilege then we will not willingly be present in the more difficult and challenging places. But if we trust God first, we can dare to live differently.
That might mean standing up against racism or prejudice, even when others in our circle would prefer silence. It might mean choosing simplicity and generosity over consumerism, because we believe life that does not consist of just possessions but in relationships. It might mean offering kindness to those our culture overlooks; refugees, the poor, those struggling with mental health, those exploring their own expression of their identity, because in them we see Christ. And it might mean forming friendships across difference, with those of other religions or no religion, not in fear of losing our faith, but in confidence that Christ’s love is strong enough to carry us into any conversation and hold us.
This is what it means to love God above even “life itself”: stop clinging to status, safety, or sameness, and to trust that real life is found in giving ourselves away.
How many of you remember the once popular school hymn; Love is something, if you give it away….you end up having more!
So let’s return to that hard saying: “Unless you hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, even life itself, you cannot be my disciple.” and let me add a few words of caution.
Throughout history, there have been those who take verses like this and use them as a weapon, to frighten, manipulate and control people.
So as disciples, we must handle passages like this with care. We read them in the whole light of Scripture where Jesus commands us to love God and love our neighbour, where Paul tells us that without love, we are nothing, and where John reminds us that God is love.
The moment that Scripture is used to instill fear instead of faith, control instead of freedom, and exclusion instead of welcome we should be on alert.
Yes, Christ calls us to place God before everything else, but in a way that deepens our discipleship and relationships rather than diminishing them or our humanity. It is not about fear or compulsion. It is not a command to isolation and lovelessness. It is an invitation to ordered love. To love God above all else, so that every other love; our families, our neighbours, and our own lives find their proper place. It is about freedom, courage, and joy.
And when God is first: Families are freed from fear and control. Churches become homes of radical hospitality. Communities learn to bridge divisions of race, language, gender, and sexuality. And the world sees a glimpse of the kingdom, where love is stronger than death.
So today’s gospel shows us that discipleship is costly, but it is also joyful. When we loosen our grip on life and entrust ourselves to Christ, we do not lose something but rather we discover life in abundance. As it says in 1 Corinthians 13 - For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known. And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.
So may we have the courage to love God first, the grace to love one another across every difference, and the joy of knowing that in Christ, nothing, neither family, nor culture, nor even death can separate us from the love of God.
Amen.