My Son, You are Here with Me Always - 4th Sunday of Lent Year C

A few years ago Pope Benedict XVI was meeting with the Jewish community of Rome and in his address the Holy Father referred to the Jewish people as "our older brothers in faith." Some Jewish groups in the United States objected to this phrase, recalling that the older brothers in the Old Testament were wicked: Cain, Ishmael, Esau, Joseph's older brothers. In response to these criticisms, the pope referred to the Parable of the Prodigal Son, the gospel for today's Mass, as the true understanding of the relationship between Christians and Jews. He reminds us all that both sons were forgiven by God, and that such forgiveness is the cause of our joy. Hence, today's Mass is traditionally referred to as "Laetare Sunday", since the theme of the Mass texts are all concerned with joy. This joy, in each of the readings, has to do with homecoming.

In the first reading, the people of Israel have finally arrived at the Promised Land, the home God promised them forty years earlier in Egypt. Imagine the joy of a people who wandered aimlessly in the desert for forty years, searching and longing for what God has promised. They suffered hunger, thirst, pestilence, and all sorts of humiliations in the desert, and yet all of it was the result of their stubbornness and sin. They relied on their own devices and powers, not on the help of God, in their quest for what truly satisfies. Thus, to hear the words of God, "Today I have removed the reproach of Egypt from you" must have been a joyous sound to their ears.

In the same way, St. Paul reminds his audience of Corinth that now with the coming of Christ our old lives of sin have passed away and we must live as a new creation. We have been entrusted with the ministry of reconciliation that was the mission of Jesus on earth. As Jesus has forgiven our sins through his death and resurrection, so we must bring reconciliation to our relationship with God and our relationships with other people. It is only through forgiveness of sins and a deep relationship with God that we can find joy and happiness in our lives. Modern society seeks happiness in the inventions of human ingenuity, only to find emptiness in the bottom of the box. As Pope Paul VI stated, "Technological society has succeeded in multiplying the occasions of pleasure, but finds great difficulty in giving birth to happiness. For happiness has its origin elsewhere: it is a spiritual thing. Money, comfort, hygiene, material security, etc. may often not be lacking, but nevertheless, despite these advantages, boredom, suffering, and sadness are frequently to be found supervening in the lives of many people" (Pope Paul VI, Exhortation, Gaudete in Domino, 1, 9 April 1975).

The prodigal son comes to realize that material possessions and pleasures cannot make him happy. He squanders the fortune his father gave him only to come to the most extreme level of depravity and want. Many individuals - even entire societies and cultures - sink to the same level of depravity and degradation and never come to their senses. This son receives the great grace of realizing his status before God and the human community. It causes within him a great repentance and resolution to make a new life serving his father. In returning to his father's house we find great rejoicing in the father and the household, but also in the forgiven son who could not have imagined being forgiven for such grievous sins. The same love and forgiveness shown to the younger son is also extended to the older son, who is indignant and cannot understand the joy of the household. We may find ourselves in a state of joyless Christianity, and so this Gospel should help us recover the joy of the authentic Christian life, so that we can utter the words of Blessed John XXIII: "I am, alas, the prodigal son who wasted your substance, your natural and supernatural gifts, and reduced myself to the most miserable state because I have fled far from you who are the Word by whom all things were made, and without whom all things turn to evil because they are nothing in themselves. And you are that most loving Father who welcomed me with a great feast when, repenting of my transgressions, I came back to your house and found shelter under your roof, in your embrace. You took me in again as your son, yet set me once more at your table, made me share in your joys: you called me once more to take part in your inheritance. Here I am in your heart! What then would you have me do?" (John XXIII, Journal of a Soul 1900, p. 68-69).