Patristic Wisdom: Looking to the Fifth Sunday after Pentecost

Do not think that I came to bring peace on earth. I did not come to bring peace but a sword. For I have come to “set a man against his father, a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law”; and “a man’s enemies will be those of his own household.” He who loves father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me. And he who loves son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me. And he who does not take his cross and follow after Me is not worthy of Me. He who finds his life will lose it, and he who loses his life for My sake will find it. (Matt 10:34–39)

He did not say that he would separate child from parent but “against his parent,” because he does not mandate a physical separation but a spiritual one. Whoever is separated physically is separated from his parent but is not against him. But whoever is separated spiritually, he is with his parent in body but against his parent in the faith. For whoever is far away from his parent is not against him by back talking, flattering and arguing. One cannot believe that he is ordering us to leave our parent when he had said, “Honor your father and your mother.” Therefore, if you have an unbelieving parent, obey him, and you will find the reward for your respect, and he will have his own condemnation for his unbelief. And so he did not say, “Whoever loves his parent is not worthy of me,” but he said, “He who loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.” Just as it is one’s duty to love parents after God, so it is a breach of duty to love them more than God. Therefore, if you have an unbelieving parent, obey him. But if he wants to plunge you into the same pit of unbelief in which he is, then love God more than your parent, because he is not the parent of your soul but of your flesh. But only God is the Father of all holy souls. Render to each person what belongs to him. Offer the obedience of the flesh to your parents in the flesh, but offer holiness of the soul to your spiritual parents.

And truly there is nothing that we ought to love more than God. Friends leave, parents fail, but Christ alone never leaves or fails at any time as long as we ourselves want to be with him. When we leave this world, every soul returns to its place, and nobody remembers the emotions of the flesh once the flesh has left—the parent does not remember his child nor the child his parent. Everything that we received from the earth will be released to the earth, and we will have nobody with us except our works; if they are good, they will redound to our glory; if they are bad, they will redound to our punishment.

One bears his cross, if he was prepared for every danger for God’s sake, even to the point of death, rather than leave Christ. Even if such a person escapes a cross by God’s mercy, he nonetheless is daily crucified as far as his intention is concerned. So even if he suffers no such thing, he nonetheless receives its reward. The will is rewarded, not the deed, because the will comes from our will, but the deed is accomplished by the grace of God.

It is better to die for God and to live forever than to live for yourself and to die forever. If he died for us, when he was not able to die unless he wanted to, how much more ought we to die for him, since we are mortal, even if we do not want to be? If the Lord died for his servants and this without a reward, it is more just that a servant should die for his Lord—especially when this is rewarded.

Anonymous, Incomplete Commentary on Matthew, Homily 25