When we hear the Gospel passage (Mt. 20:21-23) in which the mother of the Apostles James and John (to whom Jesus gave the title, “Sons of Thunder”) petitions Jesus to permit her sons to sit on his right and left side in the Kingdom to come, many of us might think: “typical Jewish mother” or “what cheek! – who do they think they are?”
But there was a time in my late teens, when, after becoming acquainted with the mystical treatises of St. John of the Cross, St. Theresa of Avila, Henry Suso, etc., and lives of various saints, I identified with the Sons of Thunder, aiming for nothing but the top. I even joined a religious order for a couple of years.
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