Fr. Louis Birabaluge, sx
TWENTY FOURTH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME
The Gospel of this Sunday: Lk 15: 1-32, is one of the most beautiful pages of Gospel, especially the last parable, mistakable known as the parable of the prodigal son. I remember one aged missionary telling me: if I one day find another religion revealing the image of God, better than this of the Gospel of Luke, describing God as Father whose mercy has limits, I will abandon my Christian faith and join that religion. He died, before he found that religion!
Indeed, the father’s attitude of the parable is so attaching and attractive because of his mercy. He is so merciful at the point that when his prodigal young son who wasted his property on a life debauchery came to beg his father’s forgiveness, the father did not even allow him to talk. The father, moved by pity, just ran to the stubborn boy, clasped him in his arms and kissed him tenderly.
This is how our heavenly Father relates to us, sinful as we are. He is a prodigal Father. He wastes all his property in order to save us. He gave all he had: His only Son who died on the Cross for our sins. He does not count our faults. He just forgives. He knows that forgiveness gives new life, brings hope. Once filled with his love that is revealed in Jesus’death and resurrection, we discover who he really is: The merciful Father. Perhaps, the most difficult step of conversion we need in our life is not primarily the repentance of sins- what is also needed- but to change the image we have created about God. Like the people of Israel (1st reading) we may refuse to welcome God as he reveals himself and create our own image of him: a calf of molten metal.
This self-created image of God calls us to reflect also on the experience of the elder brother. He was faithful, obedient. He never went out his father’s house. But, in reality, in his heart, he was out of the father’s house because he never knows who his father was. Even without going far as the stubborn young brother, he was also slave of his false image of the father. As the young brother, he is also stubborn. He needs conversion. He needs to feel at home, as a son, loved by the father, not because of his good works, but just because he is the son! The attitude of the elder brother is it not an invitation to us “so- called faithful, church goers”, who know God as a God of justice and as a cruel Judge, but not like as as merciful Father?
Jesus is the visible face his Father who is rich in mercy (Eph 2:4). If we follow him, we are lucky to be treated like Paul: a former blasphemer but now forgiven. Is it not the attitude of Saint Paul which is more suitable to us hearers of this Sunday gospel: thanksgiving and readiness to be missionaries of God’s mercy? This jubilee year of mercy is a year of grace given to all of us on our journey to conversion. Let us open our hearts and we will see how really the love of God has no limits. It’s just a prodigal love!
God’s mercy is surely free of charge. But it calls also for actions as a response. God did not save us by mere nice words. He gave his Son for us. We have an opportunity to organize a feast for ourselves and for all our brothers and sisters who are badly loved or marginalized. Apart from rediscovering the sacrament of confession as a real moment to enjoy God’s mercy and not a time to accuse ourselves in front of the ministers of the Church- sinners as us- there is also a call to rediscover the social dimension of mercy. As Christians we fulfill this social dimension by our commitment to make real what the Church calls corporal and spiritual works of mercy: “to feed the hungry, give drink to the thirsty, clothe the naked, welcome the stranger, heal the sick, visit the imprisoned, and bury the dead; to counsel the doubtful, instruct the ignorant, admonish sinners, comfort the afflicted, forgive offences, bear patiently those who do us ill, and pray for the living and the dead”. May Jesus Christ and the intercession of Mother Teresa help us to try!
TWENTY FOURTH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME
The Gospel of this Sunday: Lk 15: 1-32, is one of the most beautiful pages of Gospel, especially the last parable, mistakable known as the parable of the prodigal son. I remember one aged missionary telling me: if I one day find another religion revealing the image of God, better than this of the Gospel of Luke, describing God as Father whose mercy has limits, I will abandon my Christian faith and join that religion. He died, before he found that religion!
Indeed, the father’s attitude of the parable is so attaching and attractive because of his mercy. He is so merciful at the point that when his prodigal young son who wasted his property on a life debauchery came to beg his father’s forgiveness, the father did not even allow him to talk. The father, moved by pity, just ran to the stubborn boy, clasped him in his arms and kissed him tenderly.
This is how our heavenly Father relates to us, sinful as we are. He is a prodigal Father. He wastes all his property in order to save us. He gave all he had: His only Son who died on the Cross for our sins. He does not count our faults. He just forgives. He knows that forgiveness gives new life, brings hope. Once filled with his love that is revealed in Jesus’death and resurrection, we discover who he really is: The merciful Father. Perhaps, the most difficult step of conversion we need in our life is not primarily the repentance of sins- what is also needed- but to change the image we have created about God. Like the people of Israel (1st reading) we may refuse to welcome God as he reveals himself and create our own image of him: a calf of molten metal.
This self-created image of God calls us to reflect also on the experience of the elder brother. He was faithful, obedient. He never went out his father’s house. But, in reality, in his heart, he was out of the father’s house because he never knows who his father was. Even without going far as the stubborn young brother, he was also slave of his false image of the father. As the young brother, he is also stubborn. He needs conversion. He needs to feel at home, as a son, loved by the father, not because of his good works, but just because he is the son! The attitude of the elder brother is it not an invitation to us “so- called faithful, church goers”, who know God as a God of justice and as a cruel Judge, but not like as as merciful Father?
Jesus is the visible face his Father who is rich in mercy (Eph 2:4). If we follow him, we are lucky to be treated like Paul: a former blasphemer but now forgiven. Is it not the attitude of Saint Paul which is more suitable to us hearers of this Sunday gospel: thanksgiving and readiness to be missionaries of God’s mercy? This jubilee year of mercy is a year of grace given to all of us on our journey to conversion. Let us open our hearts and we will see how really the love of God has no limits. It’s just a prodigal love!
God’s mercy is surely free of charge. But it calls also for actions as a response. God did not save us by mere nice words. He gave his Son for us. We have an opportunity to organize a feast for ourselves and for all our brothers and sisters who are badly loved or marginalized. Apart from rediscovering the sacrament of confession as a real moment to enjoy God’s mercy and not a time to accuse ourselves in front of the ministers of the Church- sinners as us- there is also a call to rediscover the social dimension of mercy. As Christians we fulfill this social dimension by our commitment to make real what the Church calls corporal and spiritual works of mercy: “to feed the hungry, give drink to the thirsty, clothe the naked, welcome the stranger, heal the sick, visit the imprisoned, and bury the dead; to counsel the doubtful, instruct the ignorant, admonish sinners, comfort the afflicted, forgive offences, bear patiently those who do us ill, and pray for the living and the dead”. May Jesus Christ and the intercession of Mother Teresa help us to try!