23^rd Sunday in Ordinary Time, C           September 9, 2007

Dietrich Bonhoeffer, a renowned Lutheran pastor and theologian in Germany during the Nazi era, wrote a book called The Cost of Discipleship.  In it Bonhoeffer describes “cheap grace” and “costly grace.”

He says cheap grace is the preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance.  Cheap grace is accepting baptism without accepting the discipline of life in the Church.  “Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without Jesus Christ.”  Or, to put it even more clearly, Bonhoeffer says cheap grace is to hear the gospel preached as follows: “Of course you have sinned, but now everything is forgiven, so you can stay as you are and enjoy the consolations of forgiveness.”  The main defect of such a proclamation is that it contains no demand for discipleship.

In contrast to this is costly grace.  Bonhoeffer says, “Costly grace confronts us as a gracious call to follow Jesus, it comes as a word of forgiveness to the broken spirit and the contrite heart.  It is costly because it compels [one] to submit to the yoke of Christ and follow him; it is grace because Jesus says: ‘My yoke is easy and my burden is light.’”

Bonhoeffer was a member of the German resistance movement against Nazism.  He was imprisoned for his part in a plot to assassinate Hitler.  In his hearing before the Gestapo, defenseless and powerless with his only strength the word of God in his heart, he stood tall and unbroken before his tormentors.  He refused to recant, and defied the Gestapo machine by openly admitting that, as a Christian, he was an implacable enemy of National Socialism and its totalitarian demands toward the citizen. He defied it, although he was continually threatened with torture and with the arrest of his parents, his sisters and his fiancée, who all had a helping hand in his activities.  In 1944, when friends tried to free him to safety abroad, he decided to remain in prison in order not to endanger others.  While in a German concentration camp, at the age of 39, three weeks before the camp was liberated by the US army, Bonhoeffer, who was never tried, went with calmness and dignity to be hanged.  God heard his prayer and granted him the “costly grace” — that is, the privilege of taking the cross for others and of affirming his faith by martyrdom.  Bonhoeffer lived the title of his book.  His discipleship cost him his family, a future marriage, and his life.

Jesus says in today’s Gospel, “You can’t be my disciple unless you hate your family and even your own life.”  The word “hate” is an exaggeration for dramatic effect.  But this word states starkly the total commitment Jesus demands of us.

Jesus says discipleship is also like building a tower or marching into battle.  To do so, first, calculate the costs.  Do you want to be a disciple?  Then, first, count the costs.  It might even mean, says Jesus, the sacrifice of all your possessions.  This is what is meant by “if you do not renounce all your possessions, you cannot be my disciple.”

What does it cost you to follow Jesus?  It might cost you a more comfortable lifestyle; your cost might be maintaining spousal or family commitments that are difficult or unpleasant; you might have to choose new friends, not cheat in school, or be honest at work when no one else is. 

And recall Bonhoeffer.  Discipleship also means accepting the costs of life in the Church.  These costs are your time, your talent, and your treasure. 

Next Sunday we will conduct our annual parishioner stewardship commitment of time, talent, and treasure.  To prepare yourself I invite you to think about and pray about how much of your time, your talent, and your treasure Jesus is asking of you to be His disciple here at St. Catherine’s.