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Fidelis
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Catechism of the Catholic Church sections that reference the Gospel Reading include:
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March 14: Study and Meditation on the Scripture Readings for This Sunday's Mass
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Fidelis
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Here are some questions for personal reflection from my weekly Scripture study:
- What stages does the younger son go through on his pilgrimage (verses 13-16)? What brings him to his senses? What does he realize then? With what sort of attitude does he approach his father? How does the father receive his son? Why??
- How does the older brother feel about the younger brother’s return? Why? How does the father answer the older brother’s objections (verse 29)?
- What’s Jesus’ point with this parable? What does this story teach about sin, repentance and God’s love? What does the First Reading tell us about God’s care for us and his solicitude to carry us through trials and temptations to the end?
- Comparing yourself to the two brothers in this parable, who are you most like? Why? How have you experienced God as similar to this father?
- Consider verse 31: What does God have to give you that you have not taken?
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Fidelis
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A meditation for application from this week’s Catholic Matters:
APPLICATION: This parable or story refuted the Pharisees’ objection to Christ’s friendliness with sinners very effectively. The infinite mercy of God, the Father of saint and sinner, is brought out very clearly in the story of the younger son. Even though he abandoned his father, the father did not abandon him. The father’s mercy was big enough and generous enough to forgive and forget. His love for his son was strong enough to smother any feelings of personal resentment. His son’s return, humble and chastened, blotted out all his past faults and failures. It was surely an occasion for general rejoicing.
Could the Pharisees fail to see that the father in that story was God and the wayward son the sinners with whom Christ was associating? That the elder son who had stayed with his father looking after the part of the property given to him represented themselves, must have been evident to them too. They were faithful to God and to his law in most ways even if not from completely unselfish motives. But their lack of charity, especially their lack of interest in their fellow-men and the pride they took in their own strict observance, made imperfect all their otherwise good deeds. They were the elder sons, they were still nominally God’s chosen people. But their place was about to be taken by the younger son, by the sinners and publicans, by the Gentiles they so despised.
They must have seen the point of the story and the message Christ had in it for them. Yet they failed to learn its lesson. They remained stubborn in their pride and refused to accept Christ and his salvation.
For the vast majority of us, Christians, our message of consolation and hope is in the first part of today’s parable. All of us have, many a time, been prodigal, ungrateful, selfish sons of our loving Father. But he is still a Father of infinite love, of boundless mercy. He is not only waiting for us to return, like the human father in the story. He is continually sending out messengers to recall us and to help us on the return journey. Like the prodigal in the story, we may have squandered the gifts that our heavenly father gave us. We may have abused our freedom and broken his laws. We may have descended to the deepest depths of degradation (to a Jew to become a swine-herd was the last step in human debasement). We may now feel torn and tattered but, never forget it, our loving, merciful Father is waiting for us with open arms to welcome us back the moment we come to ourselves and decide to return. Until we have drawn our last breath on earth, the mercy of God and his pardon, are there for our asking
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Fidelis
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A meditation on the Gospel by Don Schwager:
**Meditation: **What’s worst than being separated from your loved ones, home, and friends? The pain of separation can only be surpassed by the joy of the homecoming and reunion. When God commanded his people to celebrate the Passover annually, he wanted them to never forget what he did for them when he freed them from slavery and death in Egypt and led them safely through the wilderness to their promised homeland. God desires that none of his children should be separated from their true homeland with him in heaven.
Jesus illustrates this passover from spiritual death to life and from the slavery of sin to freedom with the longest parable recorded in the gospels. What is the main point of Jesus’story about two ungrateful sons and their extravagant father? Is it the contrast between an obedient and a disobedient son? Or the reception given to a spendthrift son by the father and the reception given by the eldest son? Jesus does contrast the eldest son’s cold and aloof reception for his errant brother with the father’s rather lavish party and warm embrace for his repentant son. While the errant son had wasted his father’s money, his father, nonetheless, maintained unbroken love for his son. The son, while he was away, learned a lot about himself. And he realized that his father had given him love which he had not returned. He had yet to learn about the depth of his father’s love for him. His deep humiliation at finding himself obliged to feed on the husks of pigs and his reflection on all he had lost, led to his repentance and decision to declare himself guilty before his father. While he hoped for reconciliation with his father, he could not have imagined a full restoration of relationship. The father did not need to speak words of forgiveness to his son; his actions spoke more loudly and clearly! The beautiful robe, the ring, and the festive banquet symbolize the new life – pure, worthy, and joyful – of anyone who returns to God.
The prodigal could not return to the garden of innocence, but he was welcomed and reinstated as a son. The errant son’s dramatic change from grief and guilt to forgiveness and restoration express in picture-language the resurrection from the dead, a rebirth to new life from spiritual death. The parable also contrasts mercy and its opposite – unforgiveness. The father who had been wronged, was forgiving. But the eldest son, who had not been wronged, was unforgiving. His unforgiveness turns into contempt and pride. And his resentment leads to his isolation and estrangement from the community of forgiven sinners. In this parable Jesus gives a vivid picture of God and what God is like. God is truly kinder than us. He does not lose hope or give up when we stray. He rejoices in finding the lost and in welcoming them home. Do you know the joy of repentance and the restoration of relationship as a son or daughther of your heavenly Father?
*“Lord Jesus, may I never doubt your love nor take for granted the mercy you have shown to me. Fill me with your transforming love that I may be merciful as you are merciful.” *
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Fidelis
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A reflection on the readings by Dr. Scott Hahn:
Found Alive Again
Readings:
**Joshua 5:9-12
Psalms 34:2-7
2 Corinthians 5:17-21
Luke 15:1-3, 11-32 **
In today’s First Reading, God forgives “the reproach” of the generations who grumbled against Him after the Exodus. On the threshold of the promised land, Israel can with a clean heart celebrate the Passover, the feast of God’s first-born son (see Joshua 5:6-7; Exodus 4:22; 12:12-13).
Reconciliation is also at the heart of the story Jesus tells in today’s Gospel. The story of the prodigal son is the story of Israel and of the human race. But it is also the story of every believer.
In Baptism, we’re given a divine birthright, made “a new creation,” as Paul puts it in today’s Epistle. But when we sin, we’re like the prodigal, quitting our Father’s house, squandering our inheritance in trying to live without Him.
Lost in sin, we cut ourselves off from the grace of sonship lavished upon us in Baptism. It is still possible for us to come to our senses, make our way back to the Father, as the prodigal does.
But only He can remove the reproach, restore the divine sonship we have spurned. Only He can free us from the slavery to sin that causes us - like the prodigal - to see God not as our Father but as our master, One we serve as slaves.
God wants not slaves but children. Like the father in today’s Gospel, He longs to call each of us “My son,” to share His life with us, to tell us: “Everything I have is yours.”
The Father’s words of longing and compassion still come to His prodigal children in the Sacrament of Penance. This is part of what Paul today calls “the ministry of reconciliation” entrusted by Jesus to the Apostles and the Church.
Reconciled like Israel, we take our place at the table of the Eucharist, the homecoming banquet the Father calls for His lost sons, the new Passover we celebrate this side of heaven. We taste the goodness of the Lord, as we sing in today’s Psalm, rejoicing that we who were dead are found alive again.
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CatholicZ09
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I like the Gospel of the prodigal son, but I think we are hearing the one about the blind man at my church this weekend because the RCIA candidates will be present at Mass.
Either way, they are both awesome passages.
Either way, they are both awesome passages.
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Fidelis
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I love that one too! All the readings for Lent every year are always so profound–especially the Gospels. I wish I had time to do a study and meditation on them all!I like the Gospel of the prodigal son, but I think we are hearing the one about the blind man at my church this weekend because the RCIA candidates will be present at Mass.
Either way, they are both awesome passages.
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Fidelis
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A reflection on the Gospel from Fr. Thomas Rosica at Salt and Light:
Learning to Read the Signs of Love on the Journey — A Biblical Reflection for the Fourth Sunday of Lent C
Chapter 15 of Luke’s Gospel is often referred to as the “Lost and Found Collection” of the New Testament since it begins with the parable of lost sheep [vv 1-7], followed by the parable of lost coin [vv 8-10], reaching its crescendo in the parable of prodigal son [vv 11-32].
The Prodigal Son story in today’s Gospel is one of those rare gems that captivates the mind of every listener, then and now. The parable epitomizes Luke’s gifts as a storyteller – his ability to “paint” a scene with such vividness and sensitivity to human relationships that it can echo with each person’s lived experience. At different times in our lives, most of us have played each of these roles: that of the doting, loving, apparently overindulgent parent; that of the younger son who experiences being brought low by sinfulness and pride, and desperately in need of mercy; the older son, who is responsible and above reproach, and who is frustrated by the generosity and leniency with which the weaknesses and sins of others are dealt with. There is some of each of these characters in each one of us. Luke’s unique and marvelous parable of the Prodigal Son was originally aimed at Jesus’ respectable contemporaries who resented his fraternizing with tax collectors and other disreputable types.
In his 1984 Apostolic Exhortation Reconciliatio et Pænitentia that followed the Synod on Reconciliation, Pope John Paul II wrote:
The parable of the prodigal son is above all the story of the inexpressible love of a Father-God – who offers to his son when he comes back to him the gift of full reconciliation…. It therefore reminds us of the need for a profound transformation of hearts through the rediscovery of the Father’s mercy and through victory over misunderstanding and over hostility among brothers and sisters.
Portraits of the Three Characters
In the ancient Jewish world, the right of “primogeniture” (being the first-born male in a family) meant that the eldest son received a double share of his father’s inheritance. Thus, the younger son would have received roughly one-third of the value of his father’s property and possessions. But the very fact of asking for his inheritance [v 12] would have been a grave insult to his father, suggesting that his father was “taking too long to die”, and that he had become impatient with waiting for the old man’s death.
The younger son obviously goes off to a pagan (Gentile) nation [v 13], since no self-respecting Jewish farmer would raise pigs, an animal that was considered non-kosher. The son apparently traveled a long way, imagining that he would find in some other country the happiness and excitement he had apparently not found in his own land. The result was just the opposite: he is reduced to indentured slavery, is forced to tend unclean animals, and being ill-fed, he is slowly starving to death [v 17].
We are told that younger boy “squandered his property” [v 13]. Once again, this is certainly a possible meaning of the Greek noun (ousia), but it also has the sense of “his very being, himself”. Not only did the young man recklessly surrender his money and property but he surrendered himself as well: he “lost” who and what he was.
Continued on the next post.We read that the younger son “came to himself” [v 17]. Perhaps it is sufficient to say that the young man came to realize how foolish he had been and so “came to his senses”. That is a prelude to repentance, even if not repentance itself.
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The prodigal father
In one of the most poignant scenes of “an expectant father”, the old owner of this plantation sees the son, even while the boy is a long way off, walking home slowly, awkwardly and ashamed of his state [v 20]. It is the father who takes the first step, who chooses to go out and meet his wayward son en route, instead of waiting for him to come crawling home.
The father’s actions would have been considered highly inappropriate and a source of shame. The father’s reaction is an overflowing of love, compassion and tenderness: he “falls on his son’s neck”, hugging and kissing him, and demands that the symbols of his freedom and of his status within the family – the best robe, sandals, ring – be restored to him, as if nothing had happened [v 22].
This father would have been well within his rights to turn the son away, on the basis of his deeply insulting actions, and the shame he had caused his family. We can only imagine that village hostility would have been substantial upon the younger son’s return. Village families would be afraid their own younger sons would get similar ideas!
The Disease of Entitlement
The reaction of the elder son [vv 25-29] is one of righteous indignation: his words quickly make it clear that, although he has done his filial duty, it has apparently not been out of any sense of love or generosity; instead, he feels that he has been imposed upon, has “slaved away” for years for his father without appropriate gestures of gratitude. He focuses, not on what he has been given, but on what he feels he has been deprived of. He suffers from the terrible disease of entitlement!
The elder son is very concrete in condemning his brother’s behaviour, speaking of how he has “devoured your money with prostitutes” [v 30]. Did rumors about the younger boy’s actions eventually filter back to his hometown and family? Or is the elder son simply imagining the worst about his brother, and describing him in the harshest possible terms?
Concluded on the next post.The elder son has “written off” his sibling in his heart, and now refers to him only as “this son of yours” – he may be your son, but he is no longer my brother! It is, Jesus says, possible to seem to be a son without really being a son in one’s heart, and that is what the elder brother reveals by his reaction. Isn’t it interesting that the one who was believed to be free, reveals himself to have felt like a slave, and he who remained in the father’s house reveals himself to have felt like an alien and an outsider, not to have felt like a son at all?
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Working out the Reconciliation
This deeply moving parable highlights two of Luke’s characteristic emphases: God’s welcome of sinners and those considered socially and religiously unacceptable, and the rejoicing and celebration that are meant to accompany that welcome, that are meant to respond to the repentance that God invites.
The generous father of both sons welcomes back the youth who squandered his inheritance but does not repudiate the older son who protests the father’s prodigality yet remains faithful to him. “Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours” [v 31]. The restoration of the son who “was dead and has come to life”, who “was lost and has been found” [v 32], does not invalidate the fidelity of the older son. The younger son, restored to the father’s household, must make a new beginning in the life of fidelity. Reconciled to God, both sons must work out together their reconciliation with each other.
Does the elder son finally make peace with his brother and welcome him back? Does he find it in his heart to forgive, and to share in the father’s rejoicing? Or does he, in the final accounting, find himself even more alienated than his younger brother had been? Where is the mother in this story? What was her response? We are left hoping for a conclusion that Jesus never provides. That’s what the parables are all about: they invite us to enter into the story and to find the answers in our own lives and times.
The parable of “The Wayward Son” or “The Prodigal Father” or the “Indignant Elder Brother” can cause much grief for us, as we see ourselves and our motives exposed for what they really are. The prodigal Father squanders his own love on our pettiness, our meanness, our diffidence, and our arrogance.
Reading the Signs of love
For my Lenten reading this year, I came across the little gem of a book “Love Alone is Credible” by Hans Urs Von Balthasar (Ignatius Press, 2004). Toward the end of the book, these words jumped off the page:
Once a person learns to read the signs of love and thus to believe it, loves leads him into the open field wherein he himself can love. If the prodigal son had not believed that the father’s love was already there waiting for him, he would not have been able to make the journey home – even if his father’s love welcomes him in a way he never would have dreamed of. The decisive thing is that the sinner has heard of a love that could be, and really is, there for him; he is not the one who has to bring himself into line with God; God has always already seen in him the loveless sinner, a beloved child and has looked upon him and conferred dignity upon him in light of this love. [p. 103]
The Ministry of Reconciliation Entrusted to Us
Today’s second reading from St. Paul [II Cor 5:17-21] summarizes beautifully Luke’s masterful Gospel parable of the Prodigal Son. Paul attempts to explain the meaning of God’s reconciling action by a variety of different categories; his attention keeps moving rapidly back and forth from God’s act to his own ministry as well. If we are reconciled with God, with ourselves and with others, and if we in turn foster Christ’s reconciliation in society, we can make a convincing claim to be ambassadors of the Prince of Peace. Just as God took the initiative in sending his son to reconcile the world, so he expects us to take the initiative to restore harmony to a broken world, to wounded families, and an often-divided Church.
On this fourth Sunday of Lent, may we, who have been forgiven so much, embrace as brothers and sisters every sinner who joins us in the feast of forgiveness we celebrate in the Eucharistic liturgy. Along our Lenten journey on the road to the Father, may a song of gratitude and joy burst forth in the wilderness of our hearts and the deserts of our vengeance, meanness and hardness of hearts. May God teach us to read the signs of love in the world today, and gladden our hearts at the Word that sends us on our way in reconciliation and peace.
*See Fr. Roscia’s video reflection on the alternate Gospel reading about the healing of the man born blind *here
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Fidelis
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A reflection by Fr. Jack Peterson found at Catholic Exchange:
What a Father!
Stories depicting real events in the Gospels have a particular power and appeal. It is a real grace to ponder what Jesus said and did and how others responded, even if the events come to us through the perspective of a particular Gospel writer. In addition, the parables of Jesus have a special power and appeal of their own. In the parables, Jesus is able to hand craft a story to perfection. We have one of the most famous and influential parables in all of the Gospels today, the parable of the prodigal son.
While the most remarkable element of this parable is Jesus’ depiction of the Father, I want to start with the two sons. They have a way of representing us all. Most of us find ourselves like one or the other at different points in our lives. The younger son struggles with being immature on several levels and wanting to find meaning in the pleasures of life. The second struggles with pride, thinking that he is better than the younger son and that he has it harder than the younger.
The younger son is quite brash. He basically slaps his father in the face. He asks for half of the father’s inheritance before the father has passed away. Then, he squanders that inheritance on a life of dissipation, foolishly pursuing pleasure without concern for others. He ends up broke and tending the pigs on a farm which, for a Jew, symbolized that he had reached the depths of despair and humiliation. When he has literally nowhere to turn, he decides to go home to his father and ask for a place among the hired hands.
The older son, on the other hand, has a hardened heart. He seems jealous of his father’s affection for the younger son. He can’t understand why the return of the prodigal is so important to the father when he himself has been so responsible over the years. He can’t bring himself to celebrate his brother’s return. He even gets angry with the father for being so quick to take the profligate son back into his home.
The power and the beauty of the parable lie in Jesus’ depiction of the father. The father starts by giving half of his inheritance to a young son long before his death, an unheard of act of generosity. While the son was still a long way off, the father catches sight of him, giving us the sense that the father was constantly looking down the road, anxiously waiting to glimpse his son in the distance. This father would not rest until he has his son back by his side. Furthermore, the father is “filled with compassion” upon his arrival, not anger or contempt. Then, the father runs to his son, embraces him and kisses him. The robe, ring and sandals were clear symbols for the Jew that the young man was being reinstated as a son in the family because what he had done earned the punishment of being cast out of the family and permanently banned.
What do you think was dearest to the father’s heart, his estate or his son, his reputation or his son, his frustration or his son?
This is certainly the family of which I want to be a member. This is the father I want to call my own. This is the house where I want to spend eternity.
We are invited by this great parable to ask ourselves some questions this Lent. Which brother do I resemble these days? Am I being young and immature with my use of the Father’s gifts? Am I in pleasure-seeking mode? Am I thinking that the world revolves around me? Am I convinced that life is all about good times? Am I aware of the needs of those around me? Am I forgetful of where my gifts come from and that I have been given them to use in the service of others?
Am I like the older, hardened son? Do I regularly look down on others with disdain? Am I frustrated because I try so hard and others do not? Am I proud of my progress on the journey of life? Do I constantly compare myself with others? Do I have a difficult time when others receive the attention of friends, family members or colleagues at work?
Jesus uses this parable to paint a picture of our heavenly Father whose mercy is deeper than the oceans and endures forever. With a Father like that, how can we ever be afraid to come home? How can we not be moved to look over our lives, see where we have gone astray, and come back to Him with humble and contrite hearts?
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Fidelis
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Here’s a rare treat: a somewhat in depth analysis on the Gospel reading by Scripture scholar Michael Barber found on his blog, Saced Page. (the footnotes referenced can be found by going to the link above)
The Prodigal Son, New Life and Sacramental Imagery
This Sunday the Church reads the story of the Prodigal Son in the Liturgy (unless you’re doing the RCIA cycle, in which case you will read from John 9). Here I thought I’d offer a few thoughts on the story.
You’re Dead to Me
Jesus begins by telling the story of a man who had two sons. The parable begins with the younger brother going to the father and asking for his inheritance.
Of course, an inheritance is usually bestowed upon offspring after the death of the one bequeathing it. Essentially, by demanding his inheritance while his father is still alive the younger brother basically says, “Dad, you’re dead to me.”
We might note how incredible it is that the father actually honors his request―the father gives his son of his own estate while he is still living. In effect, the father impoverishes himself. Notably, the son has not told his father what he is going to do with it. Ostensibly, one could think that the son was looking to simply take responsibility of the family’s goods he would one day receive. (Though, given the fact that son has basically declared the death of his father, his next actions are not at all surprising). Yet, instead of sticking around and managing the family estate he has been entrusted with, he takes off with it!
The Son’s Loose Living and His Eventual State of Destitution
Not only does he abandon the family, he squanders what he received from his father on debauchery―i.e., “loose living” (Luke 15:13) and harlots (Luke 15:30). It is interesting that here sexual immorality is linked with the lack of responsibility to family, but here we need to resist an interesting tangent.
Ultimately, the son finds himself without any money in a foreign land. To make matters, there’s a famine. He ends up with nothing. He joins himself to one of the citizens of the country he is in (Luke 15:15) and ends up feeding his swine (Luke 15:16)―which were of course known as unclean animals (Lev 11:7; Deut 14:8; 1 Macc 1:47; b. B. Qam. 82b). Even the food of the pigs looks good to him (cf. Luke 15:16). The man has, in a sense, been reduced to the level of the swine―he is among them, one of the “unclean”. By working for a foreigner, who in all likelihood does not honor the Sabbath command given to Israel, he is essentially completely cut off from his God, his family and reduced to servitude.
Continued…It is important to point out that when the famine comes “no one gave him anything” (Luke 15:16). In fact, the only person who ever gave him anything was his father―the very person he has rejected. The son opted for the people in this distant land over him, but now that he has run out of money, they have kicked him to the side of the road―or at least, to serve alongside the pigs.
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Fidelis
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Also worth noting is the word used to describe how the prodigal “joined” himself to a citizen in the country. The word in Greek, kollaomai, is used by Paul , who used the term to describe those who are “joined” to prostitutes (1 Cor 6:16). It is also used by Paul to describe how believers ought to “hold fast” to what is good (Rom 12:9) and be “joined” to the Lord (1 Cor 6:17). Of course, this man is not holding fast to God, but to some random citizen who ultimately does little for him.
At this point we hear that the man “comes to himself” (*eis heauton erchosthai). *Here Jesus uses an idiom that is found in non-biblical literature. The phrase here does not quite mean “repentance”. In sum, the man has simply “come to his senses” by realizing that his fathers’ servants are better treated than he is. He therefore comes up with a plan. He will go back and beg his father to take him back, not as a son but as one of his hired hands.
We should note this dichotomy between sonship and servanthood, because, as we shall see, it is key in the story. The son realizes that he has renounced his sonship. But even the servants of his father are better than he is in his present state.
You Can Go Home Again
He thus comes up with a good spiel, which he hopes will allow him to return to his father’s house. He plans to go to his father and say: “Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you; 19 I am no longer worthy to be called your son; treat me as one of your hired servants” (Luke 15:18–19). He sets off for home.
His father, however, sees his son “while he was yet at a distance” (Luke 15:20). It seems the father has been looking off into the horizon. The sense one gets is that he was looking, just waiting, to see his son return. One is reminded of the story in Tobit: “Now Anna sat looking intently down the road for her son. 6 And she caught sight of him coming, and said to his father, ‘Behold, your son is coming, and so is the man who went with him!’” (Tob 11:5–6).
His father’s joy at seeing his son returning is immediately apparent. His acceptance of his son precedes his son’s request for reconciliation―a reminder that we do not need to somehow impress our heavenly Father in order to turn his attention towards us. God is always waiting for us to return to him―He loves us far more than we could ever ask him to love us!
In fact, the son isn’t even able to complete the carefully rehearsed speech he has prepared for his father. He says, “I am no longer worthy to be called your son” (Luke 15:21). Yet before he can finish the last lines of his prepared speech (i.e., “treat me as one of your hired servants”), his father exclaims, “‘Bring quickly the best robe, and put it on him; and put a ring on his hand, and shoes on his feet; 23 and bring the fatted calf and kill it, and let us eat and make merry; 24 for this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found’” (Luke 15:22–24).
The son is not welcomed back into the family because of his own clever speech―in fact, the father takes him back even before he can fully get through it. This is a reminder that salvation is a grace. As St. Paul says, “. . . no one can say “Jesus is Lord” except by the Holy Spirit” (1 Cor 12:3).
The Older Son
Continued…Now we get to the older son. Upon hearing that his brother has returned, the elder son refuses to go into the feast and welcome his brother back. His speech to his father is revealing: “‘Lo, these many years I have served you, and I never disobeyed your command; yet you never gave me a kid, that I might make merry with my friends. 30 But when this son of yours came, who has devoured your living with harlots, you killed for him the fatted calf!’” (Luke 15:29–30).
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Fidelis
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Notice that elder son describes his relationship with his father in terms of a servant–he, in effect, does not relate to him as a son but as a slave. He “serves”, and “obeys his father’s commandments”. Moreover, the reason for his service is not love but self-interest; he resents his father for not giving him anything. In a sense, the elder son, like the younger son, renounces his sonship for slavery. He even refuses to identify his brother as his brother (i.e., “this son of yours”)―he cuts himself off from the family. He does not want to feast with his family but with “my friends”.
The father however refuses to cut his son off― ‘Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours. 32 It was fitting to make merry and be glad, for this your brother was dead, and is alive; he was lost, and is found.’” Just as the father is eager to reconcile with the younger brother, so too he continues to reach out in love to his other son, reminding him of his place in his house. The elder son may cease to identify himself as a member of the family; the father, however, never ceases to call him “son”.
Resurrection Language
We might highlight the fact that the son’s return is described in terms of resurrection. The son announces when he comes to himself in the foreign land, “I will arise and go to my father” (Luke 15:18). The Greek word used for “arise,” anistamai, is the same word used for “resurrection” elsewhere in the New Testament (e.g., Luke 9:8; John 6:39; Mark 16:9; etc.). In fact, the father explains in no uncertain terms to the elder brother, “your brother was dead, and is alive” (Luke 15:32).
In turning to God from our sin we are, by his grace, “raised to new life”. St. Paul explains, “We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life” (Rom 6:4). A few passages here will suffice:
Acts 2:37–39: Now when they heard this they were cut to the heart, and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, “Brethren, what shall we do?” 38 And Peter said to them, “Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins; and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. 39 For the promise is to you and to your children and to all that are far off, every one whom the Lord our God calls to him.”
1 Peter 3:21: Baptism, which corresponds to [the Flood of Noah], now saves you, not as a removal of dirt from the body but as an appeal to God for a clear conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ. . .
Colossians 2:11–12: In him also you were circumcised with a circumcision made without hands, by putting off the body of flesh in the circumcision of Christ; 12 and you were buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him through faith in the working of God, who raised him from the dead.
The “Robe” as Baptismal Imagery
Continued…In fact, the Fathers of the Church saw the father’s act of putting a robe (stolē) on the prodigal son as a reference to the baptismal practice of the early church. As mentioned above, for the early Christians, the grace one received in Christ was understood as coming through baptism. Yet, receiving God’s grace in Christ is also linked to the action of “putting on” Christ as in putting on a garment (cf. e.g. Eph 4:23-24; Col 3:9-10). This is explicitly linked with baptism in Galatians: “For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ” (Gal 3:27).
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Moreover, in the early church baptism was typically carried out by immersion. After baptism the person came out of the waters they were typically given a new garment. In fact, the garment, specifically the robe (stolē), is linked with the saints in other places in the New Testament (Rev 6:11; 7:9, 13, 14). In Revelation it is even linked with the image of washing: “Blessed are those who wash their robes, that they may have the right to the tree of life and that they may enter the city by the gates” (Rev 22:14). The language is also linked with martyrdom (cf. Rev 3:4: “Yet you have still a few names in Sardis, people who have not soiled their garments; and they shall walk with me in white, for they are worthy”), which, of course, was closely linked to baptismal theology (e.g., Mark 10:39: “The cup that I drink you will drink; and with the baptism with which I am baptized, you will be baptized”).
The baptismal significance of the robe is recognized by patristic writers. For example, Theophylact writes, “By the servants (or angels) you may understand administering spirits, or priests, who by baptism and the word of teaching clothe the soul with Christ himself” (cited in Thomas Aquinas, Cantena Aurea on Luke 15:22).
The Feast and Eschatological Banquet Traditions
Finally, we might say a few things about the feast which is celebrated. First, let us note that, as many scholars have noted, in Luke’s Gospel Jesus constantly links table-fellowship to his ministry to sinners. Scholars have noted that such actions are likely linked to the Jewish expectation of an eschatological banquet, to be celebrated in the future age in which God would send the Messiah and redeem his people.[1] The tradition appears most explicitly in Isaiah 25:6–8:
“On this mountain the Lord of hosts will make for all peoples a feast of fat things, a feast of wine on the lees, of fat things full of marrow, of wine on the lees well refined. 7 And he will destroy on this mountain the covering that is cast over all peoples, the veil that is spread over all nations. 8 He will swallow up death for ever, and the Lord GOD will wipe away tears from all faces, and the reproach of his people he will take away from all the earth; for the Lord has spoken” (Isa 25:6–8).
Jesus specifically links Israel’s restoration with meal imagery, evoking the hope of the eschatological banquet (e.g., Luke 22:30; cf. also Matt 8:11–12//Luke 13:28–29).[2] Yet, it is not simply Jesus’ words that lead scholars to believe that this hope played a role in his ministry. Jesus’ very practice of table-fellowship with sinners in connection with his eschatological teaching would likely have been understood as evoking traditions relating to this future feast.[3]
One especially important passage here is found in Luke 13 where Jesus speaks of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob in the kingdom of God and then goes on to relate “banquet” imagery. In speaking to those who receive divine judgment on the last day, Jesus explains: “But he will say, ‘I tell you, I do not know where you come from; depart from me, all you workers of iniquity!’ 28 There you will weep and gnash your teeth, when you see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and all the prophets in the kingdom of God and you yourselves thrust out. 29 And men will come from east and west, and from north and south, and sit at table in the kingdom of God.”
What is implied in this is a feast at which the saints will be joined by Abraham, Isaac and Jacob―something Matthew makes more explicit: “ I tell you, many will come from east and west and sit at table with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven” (Matt 8:11).
Continued…At first glance it may seem that this imagery is irrelevant to the story of the prodigal son, which really only speaks of the father celebrating a banquet to welcome back his wayward boy. Yet one must look more closely at the way the story is situated.
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The reference to eating in the Kingdom is found in Luke 13, but the imagery of eschatological dining does not end there.
Feasting Imagery in Luke 14
In chapter previous to the one in which the prodigal son story is narrated, Luke sets the context for this important story―attention to the details is required.
The context for the teachings in chapter 14 is a meal―Jesus has been invited to a Pharisee’s house to dine (cf. Luke 14:1). While at the feast, in 14:7–11, Jesus gives a parable about a marriage banquet. The parable is clearly an allegory for invitation to the kingdom. But note: the invitation to the kingdom is linked with a feast.
Jesus goes on to speak of banquet imagery some more, saying that in giving a feast one ought to invite those who cannot pay you back, e.g., the blind, the lame, etc. (Luke 14:12–14).
Upon hearing the teaching, someone at the feast, clearly evoking hopes for the eschatological banquet, exclaims: “Blessed is he who shall eat bread in the kingdom of God!” (Luke 14:15).
Jesus responds to this by speaking―yet again―about a banquet. Specifically, Jesus tells the story of a man who gave a feast to which none of the people he invited came, all providing excuses (cf. Luke 14:15–20). The man then sent his servant to invite the outcasts to the feast in the place of those who did not accept the invitation (cf. Luke 14:21–23). He concludes, “For I tell you, none of those men who were invited shall taste my banquet’” (Luke 14:24). Again, Jesus speaks of salvation in terms of dining.
Luke 14 ends with Jesus applying the message of the parable―in order to be a disciple of Christ one must put aside everything. In effect, the disciple must not be like those in the preceding parable who made excuses for not coming to the banquet.
The Banquet and Rejoicing in Heaven
And so begins chapter 15: “Now the tax collectors and sinners were all drawing near to hear him. 2 And the Pharisees and the scribes murmured, saying, “This man receives sinners and eats with them” (Luke 15:1–2). Notice, once again, the imagery returns to the motif of dining.
Jesus, responding to the Jewish leaders’ expressed disdain for sinners, explains tells two stories which emphasize that he has come to seek the lost: (1) the shepherd who leaves the ninety-nine to find the one sheep that has gone astray; and (2) the woman who rejoices over a lost coin.
Then comes a key saying: “Just so, I tell you, there is joy before the angels of God over one sinner who repents” (Luke 15:10). Jesus links the return of the sinner to a heavenly celebration.
This is immediately followed by the story of the prodigal son, which recounts the return of the sinner which climaxes in a banquet. In a sense, the banquet of the father in the prodigal son story is, within the narrative of Luke, linked with the heavenly celebration of the reconciliation of the sinner to God.
The Eucharist as the Heavenly Feast
We have already mentioned that the fathers found baptismal imagery in the story of the Prodigal Son. Yet we might also note the Eucharistic imagery here tied to the feast.
In fact, the Last Supper appears as the climactic meal in Luke’s long narrative of Jesus’ table-fellowship. Indeed, scholars recognize eschatological banquet traditions in Luke’s account of the Last Supper. In particular, Jesus states at the Last Supper, “I have earnestly desired to eat this passover with you before I suffer; 16 for I tell you I shall not eat it until it is fulfilled in the kingdom of God” (Luke 22:15). Jesus then goes on to eat the Passover, which seems to link the Last Supper to the eschatological banquet of the kingdom of God.
The Eucharistic tie-in to Jesus’ table-fellowship is most especially clear in the account of two other important banquets: (1) the feeding of the five thousand (Luke 9:10–17) and (2) the meal at Emmaus (Luke 24:28–35). In both stories Jesus’ actions over the bread―“he took the bread and blessed, and broke it, and gave it to them”―evoke the Last Supper story.
In the Eucharistic feast we enter into that banquet at which we, repentant sinners, are brought into communion with God. It is not just a earthly meal―heaven rejoices with the earthly community and the sinner sits at table with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob in the presence of all the angels who rejoice over the salvation of the repentant believer.
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A reflection from CNA’s Road to Emmaus by Brian Pizzalato:
First Reading – Js 5:9a, 10-12
Responsorial Psalm – Ps 34:2-7
Second Reading – 2 Cor 5:17-21
Gospel Reading – Lk 15:1-3, 11-32
The Gospel reading for this Sunday is filled with everything that makes for a good story. It features a vivid portrayal of the characters and their relationships. We also see the themes of betrayal, intrigue, redemption, forgiveness, and love. In this week’s Gospel, Luke narrates what is typically called the parable of the prodigal son for us. However, we could alternatively call it the parable of a loving father and his two sons. Let’s take a look at each character in turn.
First, we have the younger son who asks his father for the inheritance that would normally only come to him after his dad had died. The fact that the younger son demanded his inheritance is comparable to him saying he wished his father were dead. As the story goes, the son then squanders his inheritance and is forced to take a job feeding pigs. When famine hit that distant country, the younger son found himself so hungry he was willing to eat the food the food the pigs ate. For a practicing Jew, eating the food of pigs would be the lowest of lows as swine were ritually unclean animals according to the Torah. However, hitting rock bottom leads to repentance, and he returned to his father, willing to do so even if it meant he must work for him as a servant.
Next, we have older son who stayed by his father’s side the whole time. When his brother returns, and is welcomed by their father with open arms, the older son become angry at his father. In his anger, he refuses to join the celebration held in honor of his brother’s return. His father reaches out to him, but his heart is hardened. He claims that he has not just worked for his father, but that he has slaved for him. This characterizes his mindset. He sees himself, not as a son but as a slave to his father. He is bitter at having not even received a little goat to celebrate, not with his father, but with his friends. He then refers to the younger son not as his brother, but as “your son.” Finally, he accuses his brother of sins he cannot even be sure he committed, namely “swallowing up your property with prostitutes.”
In this parable, we have the example of two children who are both far away from their father. While the one distanced himself physically and through his sinfulness, the other though was spiritually distant from his father, though physically near. Ultimately, the younger son comes back to the Father in a meaningful manner, while the older son remained distant.
The third important character is the father himself. Much can be learned through observing his reaction to his two sons. Interestingly, the father comes out to meet both sons. It seems as though the father has been watching, waiting, and hoping that his younger son will return. He sees his son coming even though “he was still a long way off.” He doesn’t wait for his son to come near. Rather, he runs out to meet him, embraces him, and kisses him. As soon as his son utters the words of repentance, the father calls for a celebration and slaughters the fattened calf. Through this action and celebration, the “prodigal son” is thus reestablished as a son in the family. Though he was hoping to be nothing more than a servant, he is welcomed back as a son.
The father also comes out to meet his older son who is sulking outside and pleads with him. However, as we have seen, the older son with have nothing to do with reconciliation.
Sin had caused the younger son’s spiritual death. But he repented. However, through reconciliation with his loving and merciful father he has been raised from that spiritual death. On the other hand, the older son chooses to remain in slavery, through his own sin against his father. He remains is as spiritually dead as his brother once was because he doesn’t see his father as loving and merciful, but instead as a slave driver.
What we should walk away from after hearing the Gospel is that God is the loving and merciful Father who awaits our return. He will run out to meet us, embrace us, kiss us, and restore us to his family through the sacrament of reconciliation.
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Reflection and questions for application by Vietnamese Christian Life (Dong Hanh) Community:
4th Sunday of Lent
Reading I: Joshua 5:9-12 II: 2Cor 5:17-21--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
**Gospel
Luke 15:1-3,11-32 **
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Interesting Details
This passage has been commonly referred to as “the prodigal son,” or “the lost son.” It was actually about both sons being lost in life. Both were treated very generously by the father; one took what he had and wasted it all, while the other was not even aware of how much he owned and thus not happy with the way the father treated him.
(v.2) This verse demonstrates the tendency of human beings to protect themselves by drawing a line between “righteous people” and “wrong people.” However, we often create our own self-righteousness by making others wrong for what they did and rejecting them.
(v.11) Two sons: Provides a ground for comparison.
(v.12) The father just did, without question, what the younger son had asked of him; he had no judgment of what the son was trying to do.
(vv.13-16) A series of wrong actions, one leading to another. While Jews could not eat pork, joining the Gentiles to feed swine and eating their food were probably not the son’s choices but rather the consequences of his earlier wrong decision for his own life.
(vv.17-18) “When he came to himself” means he was very present to how he had gotten himself to the current situation, thus he could clearly see the relationship with his father, as well as the generosity of this man. He instantly saw a solution.
(vv.20-24) The father apparently thought of nothing but the fact that the person off in the distance was his son. He had no judgment about what had happened and just wanted to welcome his son back to the full status of a son, which was symbolized by the robe, ring, and sandals.
(vv.28-31) The elder son blamed the father for mistreating him; he did not realize that he had an ownership of the estate and could treat himself any which way he wished.
One Main Point
Like the father in this parable, God has given each of us so much including the freedom to choose our own life, and He always knows us as His sons and daughters. When we have been on a wrong path and chosen to come back, He has no judgment of what we have done, and is always glad to take us back with love.
Reflections
Seeing how the lost son found the way out for his own life, when facing an undesired situation how can I be present to my own mistake, so I can clearly see myself in my relationship with God and others? What am I to do, to put my life back to where it belongs so I no longer have to struggle?
The father in this parable took his son back as if nothing had been wrong with him. Can I think of many situations in which I made someone wrong for what he or she did and then refused my love for him or her?
Like the elder son, I might have judged and blamed others including God, as if they were responsible for how I feel about myself. How do I take ownership of, and become responsible for my life?
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**“The Atonement and the Prodigal Son,” **by Dr. Marcellino D’Ambrosio, relating the Gospel reading to the Second Reading, is found on his Crossroads Initiative:
- “For our sakes God made him who did not know sin to be sin, so that in him we might become the very holiness of God”* (2 Corinthians 5:21).
Some Christians reading these words over the last few centuries have gotten the wrong idea. They’ve put this Scripture together with Jesus’ cry from the cross “My God, My God, why have you forsaken me.” Plus they’ve added to the mix the Apostle’s Creed assertion that Jesus “descended into hell.” The result is a huge misunderstanding.
It goes something like this. The sin of the human race called down the punishment not only of physical death and suffering but also spiritual death, total separation from God which is what hell is all about. Jesus bore this punishment in our place. This means that he took our sins upon himself to the point that he actually became sinful and abhorrent to the Father. He was thus truly abandoned by God on the cross and spent three days in hell, with the rest of the damned.
Let’s unravel this wrongheaded idea. Last week we discussed the true significance of “My God, My God, why have you forsaken me.” This week we need to clear up the other two misunderstandings. First, there is 2 Cor 5:21. In Hebrew, the same word means both “sin” and “sin offering,” What Paul is really saying is not that Jesus became sinful, but that he became a sin offering. This kind of sacrifice was understood as compensation or restitution to God to make up for offending him through sin. Honor and glory that God deserved had been withheld from Him; in the sin offering, perfect, costly animals, the most valuable possessions of the typical Israelite, were paid back to God in reparation.
The Passover Lamb had to be perfect, without blemish, and his bones could not be broken (that’s why Jesus legs were not broken like the two thieves, Jn 19: 32-37). Jesus did not become sinful; he was the Lamb of God who took away the sins of the world by canceling them out through a sacrifice of overwhelming value. His self-offering was an extravagant gift. It consisted of all the love, humility, and obedience that centuries of human beings owed to God but had unjustly withheld from him.
The Father is not a blood-thirsty tyrant whose wrath is appeased by the suffering of Jesus. He is the loving Father in the story of the Prodigal Son who respects his son’s freedom too much to force him to stay, or to send a posse after him once his sins led him to the brink of despair.
The Prodigal Son walked away in arrogance. He would himself have to travel the road back in humility.
Adam, Eve and all of us walked away in pride. We, their sons and daughters, would have to walk back in humility. Trouble was, we couldn’t, so deeply had we been wounded by sin. So God became man and walked the road for us, though it turned out to be the way of the cross. Perfect humility. Perfect love. Perfect suffering. Relentless and undeterred by every conceivable stumbling block and snare that hell could put in its way. That is what redeemed us and paid the debt of our sins.
But what about the phrase in the Apostle’s Creed “he descended into hell?” The word used for hell means not the inferno of the damned (Gehenna), but the abode of the dead known as Sheol, Hades, or Limbo. The meaning of this is simple– he really experienced the separation of his soul from his body. It was no drill. He really died. For us. For me. It was love to the bitter end.
So Jesus is the conquering hero, not the scape goat. His free gift of unconquerable love is what atones for our sins. And the Father rushes out to meet him in love clothing him (and us) with the resurrection.
NHIinsider has started a discussion thread on this interesting article, found here.The passion, then, is all about love. For God so loved the world that he sent his only Son who would lay down his life for not only his friends, but even for his enemies.
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A meditation and follow-up questions on the First Reading from The Word Among Us magazine:
Meditation: Joshua 5:9-12
**After miraculously crossing the Jordan, the children of Israel renewed their covenant with the Lord and celebrated their first Passover in the Promised Land. **
And then it happened: The manna stopped. The miraculous provision that had sustained them for forty years in the desert came to a halt, and the people had to learn how to live off the bounty of the land of Canaan instead. It must have felt odd to wake up that morning and not see the manna there, ready to be eaten. Now they had to work for their food.
Sometimes we can become upset about changes that come into our lives. We may not feel God’s presence in prayer the same way we did when we were just beginning to get to know him. Perhaps we move to a new parish where small differences make the liturgy feel strange to us. We get out of school, or we retire from work, or we are released from prison, and we miss the structure of a consistent daily schedule. We feel cut adrift, and we don’t know where to find God.
If you’re going through a season of change now, remember that God is the same yesterday, today, and forever. He still cares for you. Of course you should cherish the ways he met your needs in the past. But you should also be open to what he wants to do with you today. If the manna seems to have dried up, look around to find the milk and honey. Perhaps for a time you will hear his voice more clearly at Mass than in your private devotions. Instead of longing for your previous pastor, look closely for the refreshing ways your new pastor leads and serves.
Change isn’t always easy. But God always goes before you into every new situation. All you have to do is seek his presence, and you will discover new and exciting ways to meet him.
“Father, you generously provide for all my needs. You know me through and through. Please help me to embrace the new ways you want to provide for me today.”
Questions for Individual Reflection or Group Discussion
Readings: Joshua 5:9-12, Psalm 34:2-7, 2, Corinthians 5:17-21, Luke 15:1-3,11-32
- In the first reading, we see the Lord ceasing to provide manna, when the Israelites were able to produce their own grain. What do you believe is the message of this passage? How does it apply to way the Lord acts in your own life?
- The responsorial psalm invites us to “taste and see the goodness of the Lord”. What steps might you take – through your prayer and reception of the Eucharist – to deepen your relationship with the Lord and “be radiant with joy”?
- In the second reading, St. Paul speaks of the change that comes over us through our relationship with Christ – in fact more than just a change, we become a wholly “new creation.” Do you believe this? Why or why not? In what ways does your life reflect the reality that you are a new creation in Christ? In what ways does it not? What can you do to make it a greater reality in your life?
- St. Paul tells us we are ambassadors of reconciliation. Ambassador, what practical steps can you take to reconcile yourself with others with whom you may have quarreled or harbor resentments or unforgiveness? What can you do to bring reconciliation to your family or to your parish?
- In the familiar Gospel story of the prodigal son, the younger brother demands what his fathers “owes” him and then leaves? What are the circumstances in your life that can cause you to value what God can do for you more than you value a relationship of love and intimacy with him?
- Have you ever gone through a “pigpen” experience? Share with others the moment when you came to your senses.
- In what areas of your life do you see attitudes like the older brother (e.g., lack of gratitude, lack of compassion, unforgiveness, self-centeredness)? What steps can you take to change this attitude?
- In the meditation, we hear these words, “Change isn’t always easy. But God always goes before you into every new situation. All you have to do is seek his presence, and you will discover new and exciting ways to meet him.” Do you believe this? Why or why not? Take some time to pray for yourself, and others close to you, that you and they would trust in the Lord and embrace any changes going on at this time. Use the prayer at the end of the meditation as a starting point.
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