Homily Lent 4C: God's fatherhood, our sonship and our brotherhood

Homily for 4th Sunday of Lent Year C 2019 

Joshua 5:9a,10-12; 2 Corinthians 5:17-21; Luke 15:1-3,11-32

Introduction 

Did you know that the writers of the Bible did not give the passages any headings or names; those were added later.  That is why some have suggested alternative titles for today's parable, which we know as the parable of the Prodigal Son. 

• Some have called the "Parable of the Lost Son" coming as it does after the two parables of the Lost Coin and the Lost Sheep. 
• Others have called it "The Parable of the Merciful Father", focusing on the love and the mercy that the Father shows both sons. 
• And Pope Benedict suggested the name, "The Parable of the Two Sons." 

For our reflection today, I would like to focus on these last two titles, to show that this parable is really first about the mercy and compassion of the Father, and secondly about the sin, not just of the younger son, but of both sons. 

Scripture and Theology 

From the parable we learn that ours is a merciful and loving father, in at least two ways.  First, God is the kind of father who respects the freedom of his children.  Unlike some fathers, the father in the gospel story does not use the inheritance to hold the younger son hostage; he lets him go.  He knows that every child reaches an age when he wants to be his own man, make his way in life, even making mistakes and hopefully learning from them.  Of course by doing this the father risks being forgotten forever; but still he does not stop his son from exercising his free will.   

Secondly, God is a forgiving father, who anxiously waits for his sinful children to return. And when they do, he rushes out to meet them and bring them back. 

• We heard that the younger son, after squandering his money on loose living, realized the error of his ways and returned to the father.  But "While he was still a long way off, his father caught sight of him, and was filled with compassion. He ran to his son, embraced him and kissed him."  The Father decked him out in the finest clothing and jewellery, and ordered a festival in his honour, with the main dish being the fattened calf. 
• And with the older son, the one who refuses to come in and join the feast, again the father went out there to seek him and plead with him.  He told him: "My son, you are here with me always; everything I have is yours."  He never forced him to come into the house and the story does not tell us if the son did.  But it was not for lack of trying on the father's part. 

And so, God our Father, like the father in the story, has both respect for our free will and mercy for our conversion, when we choose to exercise either of them. 

Christian Life 

When you have such a father, what kind of son or daughter are you?  That brings us to the title suggested by Pope Benedict, "The Parable of the Two Sons."  For when we hear this parable called the Parable of the Prodigal Son, we only think of the younger son as the sinful one; we forget that both sons were imperfect. 

From the younger son, we learn to avoid entitlement and to practice conversion. 

Rather than always demanding: "Father give me the share of your estate that should come to me," we allow God to give us freely what he thinks we really need.  In our prayer, we can request, but must we leave it to God to grant our requests.  We must not demand, bribe or grab. That was the sin of Adam and Eve who ate of the fruit of the tree, so that they could get for themselves knowledge apart from God.  That can be our sin today, when we take, take, from God, but never give, give at all.  And of course this entitlement is the root cause of materialism, consumerism and all the other sins that come from misusing what God has given us.  That is what the younger son does too. 

In addition to the entitlement, the younger son is also guilty of abandoning his Father, and going to a pig-raising foreign land. In an agricultural community like Judah, when a son got his inheritance, he did not depart, but stayed on the farm to help his father.  We do something similar when we abandon God and his Church, and go out there, as it were, in a land foreign to the faith. 

2. But from this son, we also learn what to do, especially when we sin.  As a Jewish man, being reduced to feeding pigs, unclean animals for that religion, was the lowest one could get.  He had scraped the bottom of the barrel.  That is when he realized that going back to his father, not as a son but as servant, would still be much better than being in his situation.  And so he went and said: "Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you; I no longer deserve to be called your son."  But the Father received him back as a son. 
3. 
   

Don't we too sometimes find ourselves at the bottom of the barrel, struggling with sins of purity, with our marriage, with our work situations, or even prayer? Like the younger son, we too should examine ourselves, become contrite and return to the Father in confession to seek his mercy. In fact, during confession, we use virtually the same words of this parable when in the act of contrition we say: "O my God, I heartily sorry for having sinned against you." 

Even the older son can teach us something to imitate and a few things to avoid. 

1. Starting with his good qualities, clearly he was a committed son.  When the younger son went off and abandoned the dad, he stuck around.  He is diligent and obedient, like he says himself: "Look, all these years I served you and not once did I disobey your orders."  Every day, he works hard: he can be counted on to deliver the calf at 2.00 in the morning, milk the cows at dawn and take the oxen out to plough in the hot sun.  In fact, it seems that he was yet even taken a penny of the inheritance, for he tells his father: “you never gave me even a young goat to feast on with my friends.”  Would we not like to have a child like him? 
2. 
   

How many of us can claim this level of diligence, obedience and commitment to our earthly parents and perhaps even more importantly to our heavenly Father?  Can we learn something from this older son? 

2. At the same time, this older son has some vices that we must avoid: As a son, he thinks of himself as a slave to his father, rather than as a beloved child.  He wants to buy his father's love by hard work and blind obedience.  But as  Jesus puts, "I no longer call you slaves, because a slave does not know what his master is doing. I have called you friends, because I have told you everything I have heard from my Father" (Jn. 15:15).  God wants sons and daughters who love him for him, not simply out of fear of him. 
3. 
   

As a brother, the older son harbours jealousy and envy towards his brother. While jealousy wants to keep others from getting what I have, envy wants to get what others have.  The older son is guilty of both.   

Jealousy makes him want to keep the father's love for himself and not share it with his little brother.  We too can be like him when we deny that God could love people of a different religion, race or even sinners. 

Envy makes him not want the younger son to have the father's forgiveness.  Don't we also sometimes think that God and the Church are too merciful, reaching out to sinners, prisoners, immigrants, the poor, people who don't deserve compassion?  In fact, it is to address such envy that Jesus told this parable, because the Pharisees were grumbling that “This man welcomes sinners and eats with them.” 

Conclusion 

And so, as we continue our Lenten journey of repentance, let us reflect on this parable and what it has to say to us.  Let this parable remind us that we have a Merciful Father, who welcomes us whether our sin be that of the younger son, or that of the older son, whether it be that of abandoning him or that of detesting him for his mercy.  For it is a parable, not just about the Prodigal Son, but about the Two Sons, Two Sons who are lost, and are received by a Merciful Father.