23rd Sunday in Ordinary Time 2025

 A friend of mine in New York told me this story. One weekend, her sister and another friend came to visit. They spent the whole weekend sightseeing—Times Square, Central Park, the Statue of Liberty—the works.

On Sunday morning, they stepped into a beautiful old church just to take a look around. But as they were walking down the aisle, the bells started ringing and Mass was about to begin.

My friend and her sister looked at each other. “Let’s stay for Mass,” they said.

Their other friend stopped in her tracks. “Mass? Now? We’re in New York City! We don’t have time for that—we’ve got places to go!”

But the sisters stood firm. “No. This is important to us. We’re staying.”

And so they stayed for Mass. Their friend was upset—angry even—but they chose Jesus first.

It’s a small moment, but it says a lot. Sometimes, following Jesus means making choices that others—even people close to us—don’t understand.

That’s what makes today’s Gospel so challenging. Jesus says, “If anyone comes to me without hating his father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, even his own life, he cannot be my disciple.” It sounds harsh, but it’s hyperbole. He doesn’t mean we literally hate our families. He means that if we are going to follow Him, He has to come first. Our loyalty to Him must be deeper than even our strongest human ties.

That’s what those sisters lived out in that little church in New York. They put Him first, even at the cost of a friend’s approval.

But discipleship isn’t only about split-second choices in the moment. It’s also about preparing ahead, making sure Jesus is part of the plan before the choice even comes. I saw that a few years ago in Schroon Lake, when a man called the rectory. He told me, “Father, I’m leading a group of Boy Scouts on a camping trip to your area, and I need to know when Sunday Mass is.” I told him, “Mass is at 11 o’clock this Sunday.” He said, “Perfect! That works for us—but we won’t be there until next month.”

He wasn’t scrambling at the last minute. He had already built Mass into the plan, already decided that Jesus was going to come first. That’s exactly what Jesus is getting at when He says, “Which of you wishing to construct a tower does not first sit down and calculate the cost?”

Put those two stories together and you see what Jesus means. Sometimes discipleship means making a hard choice in the moment. Sometimes it means planning ahead so Christ is in the foundation of everything. Both take sacrifice. Both take commitment. Both are ways of carrying the cross and putting Him first.

And here’s the paradox: when we put Jesus first, it doesn’t diminish our love for family and friends—it deepens it. He teaches us to love them not just with our natural affection, but with His divine love.

So maybe the question for us today is simple but challenging: where is Christ in my priorities? Is He at the center of my daily choices? Is He factored into my plans before I even begin? Following Him costs something. But He never asks us to carry the cross alone. He walks with us, and when we put Him first, He gives us back everything else in a new and beautiful way.