Fr. J. D. Ousley

David Brooks is one of the most-discussed social commentators of our time. Brooks is perhaps best known for a term that he invented, "bobo."

"Bobo" is short for: "bourgeois bohemians" -- those aging Baby Boomers who want to pretend that they are still as hip and counter-cultural as they were in the 1960's while they enjoy the middle class lifestyle they can now afford.

Recently, David Brooks wrote a magazine article about a subset of this group whom he calls, "patio man." Patio man lives in a new gated community; he loves to have his friends over to his house, so he can cook dinner for them on his extremely elaborate outdoor grill. (There are also, I suppose, "patio women," but Brooks focuses on the male chef, who runs the party.)

Now what you might ask, would "bobos" and "patio men" have to do with today's Gospel lesson? Well, that's exactly the question I've been asking!

For people who devote their energies to personal security and social advancement and conspicuous consumption wouldn't seem to want to hear Christ's uncompromising words. Jesus tells those who wish to join his movement: "If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it."

Now, how can you lose your life and still keep up with your neighbors? How can you take up your cross and at the same time buy a big house in a gated community?

But Patio Man would hardly be the first person to hear the ground rules of the Christian faith and object! As it happens, just before Jesus makes his pronouncement about taking up crosses, he has a sharp interchange with his disciple, Peter.

For Jesus has also predicted his own persecution and death. His cross would be a cross made of wood and his cross would kill him.

But Peter, Christ's Number One follower, hears this predictions and takes Jesus to one side and "rebukes" him!

And who can blame Peter? He doesn't want to lose his beloved leader, nor does he want to give up his own quite satisfactory life.

Peter was perfectly happy to listen to Jesus and discuss his interesting ideas. Peter doesn't even mind the itinerant lifestyle. (He likes wandering around Galilee with his beloved leader, preaching and healing.)

But all this talk of crosses? Crosses were not what he had in mind when he left his fishing nets, and went off to follow Jesus.

Now in retrospect, we can see that Peter deserves his rebuke. For we know the ultimate purpose of Christ's mission wasn't to provide a long, placid life to either bohemians or bourgeoisie.

Moreover, we know that Christ's sacrifice was for a greater good: It was for the ultimate purpose expressed in that mystical text: "God so loved the world that he gave his only-begotten Son, to the end that all who believe in him should not perish, but have everlasting life."

Maybe Peter was bewitched by an alternative future. According to that time track, he and the other disciples and Jesus would enjoy their own little gated religious community.

They would talk and they would laugh. They would teach and they would heal. The years would pass and they would grow old together, giving thanks to God for the blessings of this life.

Not really an unreasonable request. And if that's the sort of calm and contented future Peter had in mind, we can see the reason why he was upset with Christ's teaching. We, too, may rebel at the idea that Christianity must include crosses.

Of course, we are also be aware of the many theological explanations that have been offered over the centuries for Christ's way of sacrifice. We're looking at some of these reasons in the Lenten classes as we explore the counter-cultural side of Christianity. But, still, all in all, we, too, would prefer to find our lives without losing them!

By contrast, it's interesting, that while Jesus must have been well-aware of the human tendency for self-preservation, he doesn't seem in the least interested in preserving himself! So what if Peter is upset? That's Peter's problem.

For Christ, God doesn't offer cheap grace -- only costly grace.

Christ's mission has already been plotted out. He doesn't care whether he pleases the people around him. Jesus says in Mark's Gospel: "Those who are ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of them the Son of Man will also be ashamed when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels."

Indeed, from the perspective of eternity, the concerns of Peter look less urgent.

As for this life, Jesus asks a pointed question to all of us: "For what will it profit them to gain the whole world and forfeit their life?"

Those who "have everything" may know this better than anyone: they know that gaining the world's wealth or the world's applause doesn't guarantee happiness.

In fact, those who have everything know that life gives us crosses to bear that money can't avoid: crosses of love, crosses of ignorance, crosses of mortality.

St. Peter's problem was that he thought that religion would shield him from crosses. And it didn't. And religion doesn't shield us, either.

The recently-enthroned Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams holds that denying oneself means letting go: letting go of all comfortable links with the familiar, including the familiarities of religion. He writes, "To 'deny oneself' is a radical matter, a loosening of our hysterical, terrified grip on what we know and are comfortable with. 'Denying oneself' amounts to the decision that I am not going to try to shape the truth to my wants and needs, but that I am determined to accept the truth as it is, not as I want it to be; to accept that I am part of reality, not the lord of it."

As Peter discovered, religious status doesn't make us lords of reality -- any more than being Patio Men will make us rulers over the problems of life.

But, as Jesus knew, and as Peter later discovered when he found the courage to follow Christ even at the cost of his own life when we let go of the superficial, we are given a way to the profound. When we leave the familiar, we are led into the realm of the Spirit, to what Rowan Williams calls, "intimacy with God."

Archbishop Williams writes, "To take Jesus' cross means to enter into this: a commitment to God for his own sake, whatever happens, a declaration that we are ready to face the cost of truth, to let God be God and not presume he shall and shall not be according to our selfish wants."

To let God be God -- and then, as Jesus hinted, to be released from anxiety about this life and to be touched by the glory of God and to be comforted by his angels.

And now unto that same God Father, Son, and Holy Spirit be ascribed as is most justly due all might, majesty, power, dominion and praise, now and forever, Amen.