Sunday, 27 March 2022

Fourth Sunday of Lent

 

FOURTH SUNDAY LENT, JOSHUA 5. 9a, 10-12, 2 COR 5. 17-21, LUKE 15. 1-3. 11-32

Focus: Repentance, return and renewal are the key ways for a changed and transformed life. Such a life is the best testimony for true faith and discipleship

1.       The gospel of the day presents before us the parable of the prodigal son. This is very popular and familiar. Three figures stand out, namely, the father, the younger son and the elder son. The younger son is the central figure because of his repentance, which is the key theme of holy lent. However, the other two too are very significant. All the three teach us some fundamental life-lessons.

2.       Contextually, the father in the story refers to God the Father; the younger son refers to the gentiles and all the despised and the sinners that include the Samaritans, prostitutes, and the tax collectors; the elder son refers to the Jews, the chosen people. The Jews had great contempt toward all the non-Jews and condemned them. But, Jesus elevates them over and above the Jews.

3.       Practically and existentially, the parable is not just a historical story. This is a living story. It is our own story, each one’s. The father is God the Father; the elder son represents all the self-righteous, the so-called holy and religious people. The younger son represents all those who are fragile and wayward.

4.       From the part of God, His loving mercy is never tired or fed up with us. He never abandons us. He always loves us and waits upon us to repent and return. He is ever ready and eager to receive us into His arms and embrace us. He does not wait to chide us or question us or penalize us. For Him, it is enough that we realize our deviations and repent and return to Him. He celebrates our return and restores us to the original dignity.

5.       Most of us may resemble the prodigal son. Like him, our fragility leads us to prodigality. We want to go away from the Father and His house. We reject His love, relationship, counsels and guidance. We have a sense of false freedom, we feel suffocated and restricted. Many times, we want to be totally free to do whatever we like and prefer.

6.       Like the prodigal son, we too let ourselves loose. We fall into unnecessary and unworthy interests and pleasures. We squander away our resources, money and energies on vain and harmful aberrations. We lower ourselves into undignified piggy situations.

7.       While this “falling” takes place in any one’s life, what is important is that we also “rise up” like him. This needs a sincere realization and repentance, return and reconciliation. We need to be anguished over our prodigality, our faltering steps. We must rise, retreat our steps, reunite with the Father, recognize our unworthiness, reconcile with Him and thus regain our lost dignity.

8.       In this context, we must consciously guard against the ‘elder son’s syndrome’. He suffers from a self-righteous attitude. He regards himself as a righteous and loyal person. And he disregards his brother as a loose immoral. He disowns his own younger brother and so distances himself. He does not even want to address him as his brother. He protests before his father, “This son of yours has devoured everything" (Note! He does not say, “this brother of mine”). His attitude and relationship with his father is also very wrong. This is evident in his grievance against his father: “all these years I have been working like a slave…”

Direction: A son is not a slave. A son does duties out of love and freedom and not out of slavery or servitude. Only in repentance and renewal, we find our true belongingness to God


(REFLECTION 2)

1.       The story of the prodigal son is very familiar to all, and thus there is also the tendency to take it for granted. First of all, it is not a mere story of an individual, of the past. Rather, it is the story of each of us, and is a present, ongoing story. It reflects everyone in our basic human fragility, frailty and vulnerability, as well as the capacity for nobility to rise above. There is an inherent tendency to be prodigal, but also a strong drive for renewal as well.

2.       Thus we can trace two movements in this whole journey of the prodigal son: a downward movement leading to ruin, and an upward movement leading to restoration. While the downward sliding is due to the human weakness that always surrounds us and waits to pounce upon us to strike us down, the upward soaring is due to the divine benevolence and strength that also super-abounds in us and shields us and is eager to lift us up. The prodigal son’s fall and rise symbolize our fallibility and conversion, and his restoration confirms God’s condescending mercy and forgiveness, and an indulgent and positively prodigal generosity of the Father, symbolized in the father in the gospel.

3.       The repentance and conversion of the prodigal son was made possible, certainly due to the deep awareness of the misery of his fallen condition, but also due to a profoundly piercing and anguishing consciousness of the surpassing love of the father. This makes to us very clear that a true repentance is possible, deep and durable, only when there is an authentic anguish at causing immense pain to the Father. Awareness, acceptance and encounter of human fragility and divine nobility will result in human repentance, divine forgiveness, and regain of the lost human dignity

4.       Now coming on to both the movements, the whole story can be presented in a series of alphabet R: the downward comprises Resent, Refuse, Reject and Ruin, and the Upward comprises Reflect, Remind, Recall, Realise, Repent, Resolve, Rise, Return, Rekindle, Reconcile, Reunite, Regain and Rejoice

5.       In the downward movement, we see that the prodigal son resents any good, any advice, admonition and guidance that is proposed to him, refuses to take heed and to make amends, and thus rejects all the dignity, the freedom, the closeness of being the son to the father in the house, and opts to ruin himself, by dissociating and distancing himself from the house and the father. This ruinous condition can be amply clarified in reflecting a little in detail on his “piggy” situation: in his pathetic and deplorable condition of misery, he is not only among the pigs, not only works with and for them, but also becomes one of them; he becomes like them, and no different from them

6.       It is worthwhile for us to see how this piggy situation prevails over us as well, in so far as we too embody the same qualities of a pig: dirty, smelly, noisy, lazy, does not realize the value of what is valuable, is led by the mob mentality, stubborn, aggressive and reactionary, quarrelsome and fighting, always stoops down, unsteady running after any pig, and swallowing anything indiscriminately. How often do we dirty and soil ourselves, by unclean thoughts, words and actions? How often do we spread around foul smell through our ill-placed words and deviated motivations? How much do we resent silence and interiorisation, eager to be noisy, and also intimidate and bulldoze others by big mouths and damaging speech? How often are we so slothful, and thereby neglect our duties, and also obligations and promptings of charity? How often are we negligent and indifferent toward what is sacred and precious? How often do we become so impulsive and indecisive, easily misled and carried away by the mob mentality? How often are we adamant and obstinate, sticking to our own ideas and opinions, refusing to be flexible and accommodative? How often are we resentful and violent in our attitude and approach? How eager are we often to react and get into conflict? How often do we stoop down so low and below, remaining earth-bound, succumbing to lesser urges and interests? How much we can be so unstable and unfaithful in our relationships and friendships, being flirting and frivolous? How often do we willingly devour so indiscriminately and unwisely, any rubbish and harmful that is present and presented to us? Is this not the “pig” nature in us?

7.       The story of the prodigal son becomes a worthwhile and memorable one, because he does not stop with the downward movement, but sets upon the upward movement. He reflects on his piggy situation. He reminds himself of his past good times. He recalls the past glory in contrast to the present misery, the past abundance in contrast to the present scarcity, the past freedom in contrast to the present slavery, the past dignity in contrast to the ignominy, the past closeness with the father in contrast to the present distance. He clearly realizes that he has made the greatest blunder. He deeply repents, being pierced in the deepest recesses of his heart, that he “broke his father’s heart”, “sinned against his father and the heavens”, and that he is “no longer worthy to be the father’s son”, and so deserves “only to be counted among the father’s many servants”. He resolves to make repairs. He rises, not only physically but also from his fallen condition. He returns to the father, retracing his steps to where he came from, and being directed back to the father. He meanwhile rekindles within, that lost fire of love for the father. He gets reconciled with the father. He is reunited with him concretely and directly. He is restored to his original dignity and relationship and thus he regains what was lost. All this results in a true rejoicing and celebration.

Can we too make this upward journey? How long do we want to be content with the ruinous downward journey, stooping to sin and steeped into it? Can we raise ourselves and rise up and regain our lost dignity and communion?

 

 

 


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