(For the audio version of this blog, please visit: https://brothersinchristcmf.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/06/Mass-Blog-for-the-Solemnity-of-the-14th-Sunday-in-Ordinary-Timet-2025.mp3)
When Pope Francis died in April, one might have wondered not only who would succeed him, but who would want to. This is an office best inhabited reluctantly but with great faith. History’s best role models for God’s spokespeople have always been those who didn’t want that power in the first place. Jonah, Moses and Gideon are the strongest Old Testament examples. But leave it to the disciples of Jesus to show how leadership’s power flickers in the learning stages.
In Mark’s gospel (Mark 10:43), when James and John ask for places of honor at their Master’s power table, Jesus gives this advice to them and anybody put in a position to lead:
“Whoever wishes to be great among you will be your servant; whoever wishes to be first among you will be the slave of all. For the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many.”
Giving one’s life is the cost of leadership. Look at photos of this world’s leaders at various points during their service and you see the toll their office takes. Power isn’t enjoyable for long. Like electricity, earthly power must be tolerated by its carriers as it passes through them.
But faith tells us that our God is a servant leader who has instilled the otherworldly powers of love and hope into our faith to make His power not only tolerable, but life-sustaining. The prophet Isaiah is one of the earliest and best examples of reluctant faith leadership, powered by that love and strengthened by the courage to say “Here I am! Send me!” In Sunday’s first reading, Isaiah is confident the people he’s sent to serve will benefit from God’s power:
As a mother comforts her child, so will I comfort you; in Jerusalem you shall find your comfort. (Isaiah 66:10-14c)
But today, Jerusalem is threatened by forces fighting to wield power over its geography rather than to draw and share God’s power with the world. Isaiah anticipated and Jesus built the otherworldly kingdom whose law of love would overrule the laws by which lawless people kill each other. One of those killers was Saul, who, upon learning how fragile were the laws for which he was persecuting and killing people, pointed the way as Paul to the only law we were called to be one with. Sunday’s second reading from his letter to the Galatians states:
May I never boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world. For neither does circumcision mean anything, nor does uncircumcision, but only a new creation. (Galatians 6:14-18)
Jesus sent his recruits out into the world to build bridges leading to that new creation. As Sunday’s gospel reading tells us, they came back almost drunk with the power they felt (Luke 10:1-12, 17-20 ). Like any earthly leader entrusted with such great power, they must first be humbled by the knowledge that this world is not its source, but its channel. As Jesus reminded his power-drunk minions,
“I have given you the power to ‘tread upon serpents’ and scorpions and upon the full force of the enemy and nothing will harm you. Nevertheless, do not rejoice because the spirits are subject to you, but rejoice because your names are written in heaven.”
May the service of Pope Leo XIV and every spiritual leader give them the wisdom to understand, and the power to live up to, the names by which God called them.
–Tom Andel
Love all of this, great work Tom! Personally, your message is very timely as well so I appreciate it extra.
This also makes me think of the quote, “The three most important virtues are humility, humility, and humility.” ~ St. Bernard of Clairvaux. With leadership this is especially true.
Thanks for highlighting this great saint, Mike. Leaders would benefit from taking an even deeper dive into his insights about humility. They’ll find nuggets like the one you cite and this one: “It is no great thing to be humble when you are brought low; but to be humble when you are praised is a great and rare attainment.” Your praise reminds me I have a lot to be humble about.
We are in constant need of reminder that all we are, all we do, and all we have are directly given us by our Lord Jesus. He created us. He directed us to the place and people we belong to and grew with. He decided everything that impacts our life from the day we were conceived until our light goes out at the end of this temporary life.
We so often think we have complete control over our lives, and yes through free will once we become adults and start making decisions for ourselves, we have a level of influence. But we need to keep in mind how it begins with God, and ends with God, and the closer and more focused on Him we are, the better our life trajectory will be and in harmony with why he sent us in the first place.
Jesus’ blood relative, King David, had much power but many enemies. Sometimes he was his own worst enemy. Jesus often cited David’s psalms when teaching and praying. Psalm 143 is a good one to ponder when we feel our control slipping: “I stretch out my hands to you; I thirst for you like a parched land. Hasten to answer me, Lord, for my spirit fails me. Do not hide your face from me, lest I become like those descending to the pit.” The pit is where we put ourselves when we forget who brought us out of it.