LENT IV-C: Jos 5:9, 10-12; II Cor 5:17-21; Lk 15:1-3, 11-32

There is a story about a widow who during the First World War lost her only son and her husband. She was especially bitter because her neighbor, who had five sons, lost none of them. One night while this woman’s grief was so terribly severe, she had a dream. An angel stood before her and said, “You might have your son back again for ten minutes. What ten minutes would you choose? Would you have him back as a little baby, a dirty-faced little boy, a schoolboy just starting to school, a student just completing high school, or as the young soldier who marched off so bravely to war?” The mother thought a few minutes and then, in her dream, told the angel she would choose none of those times. “Let me have him back,” she said, “when as a little boy, in a moment of anger, he doubled up his fists and shook them at me and said, ’I hate you! I hate you!” Continuing to address the angel, she said: “In a little while his anger subsided and he came back to me, his dirty little face stained with tears, and put his arms around me. He said, ‘Momma, I’m sorry I was so naughty. I promise never to be bad again and I love you with all my heart.’ Let me have him back then,” the mother sobbed. “I never loved him more than at that moment when he changed his attitude and came back to me. Jesus said that this is how God feels about each of us.

Acknowledging the allegation that Jesus mingled with the sinners, Jesus outlines the three aspects or dimensions of repentance in the parable, by presenting three characters: 1) the repentant younger son, 2) the forgiving father and 3) the self-justifying elder son. This is a double-edged parable. The lesson of Divine mercy to sinners is shown by the Father’s reception of the returned younger son. A stern warning is given to the self-righteous people by presenting the dialogue between the father and his older son.

From this Laetare Sunday (Rejoice Sunday) we are moving swiftly toward the end of our Lenten fast, and the joy of Easter is already on the horizon. This Sunday is set aside for us to recall God’s graciousness and to rejoice because of it. In many ways we have been dead, but through God’s grace we have come to life again; we have been lost but have now been found. We have every reason to rejoice.

According to the law and customs in ancient Palestine, a father could dispose of his property by making a will that would be executed when he died (Numbers 36:7-9) or he could give his possessions to his children while still alive. Usually the eldest son received a double share or twice the amount that each of the other sons would receive. But in the parable, the father promptly gave a share of his property to his younger son, bid him a tearful farewell and waited daily for his return. Finally, after squandering his money, his morals and even his Jewish religious heritage, the boy returned in rags. He confessed his sins, and his father promptly forgave him, kissed him on the cheeks, and healed the broken relationship between them. He ordered a bath for his son, gave him new garments (a sign of honor) and a golden signet ring (sign of authority and trust). By ordering sandals for the feet of his son, the father signaled his reacceptance of the returned penitent as his son. The robe and ring and shoes were a sign that the son would not be received into the house as a servant (slaves did not wear shoes, robes or finger rings) but in his former status as son. The killing of the fatted calf, specially raised for the Passover feast, meant that the entire village was invited for the grand party given in the returned son’s honor.  Mirroring our Heavenly Father, Jesus, too, squanders his love on those who need it most. Although the story of the prodigal son is often given as an example of repentance, it is actually the story of how God forgives and heals the repentant sinner.

There is spiritual famine all over the world, especially in countries with booming economy. Examples of this spiritual famine can be seen in drug and alcohol abuse, fraud and theft in the workplace, murders, abortions and violence, premarital sex, marital infidelity and priestly infidelity, as well as in hostility between people. Sometimes this “spiritual famine” exists in our own families. That is why we condemn some of our family members to “survival-level” existence, and even contribute to the death of some of them, by refusing to associate with them, like the elder brother in the parable. Let us accept the fact that we have been squandering God’s abundant blessings not only in our country and in our families, but also in our personal lives.

Lent is a time to “pass over,” from a world of sin to a world of reconciliation. The message of Lent then, is, as St. Paul tells us,  “We implore you, in Christ’s name: be reconciled to God.”  The first step, of course, is to do as the younger son did: “When he came to himself, he said: ‘I will break away and return to my father, and say to him, “Father, I have sinned against you.” At every Mass, we come to our loving Heavenly Father’s house as prodigal children. And we receive forgiveness from him. But do we feel the joy of coming back? If we don’t, we are like the elder son who thought he didn’t need his Father’s forgiveness. Let’s ask the Lord for the grace of true repentance like that of the younger son so that we may have true joy on the feast of Resurrection.

LENT III : Ex 3:1-8a, 13-15; I Cor 10:1-6, 10-12; Lk 13:1-9

Jesus' comment about the people who had died tragically in the incident with Pilate's soldiers and in the collapse of the tower would have surprised his listeners. Popular opinion at that time drew a direct line of causality from people's sufferings back to their personal sins.  We know people asked Jesus once, whose sins it is that this man was born blind. By this logic, the Galileans who were killed by Pilate's soldiers must have deserved it because of some particularly heinous sins.

But Jesus takes a different angle. He emphasizes that everyone who refuses to repent will stay separated from God. And if they die in such a state of alienation they will all perish. Earthly tragedies like the ones mentioned should remind us of the passing nature of earthly life.  Therefore it is the time to repent and be reconciled with God and neighbor.

What does it mean to repent? It means to turn around. Instead of looking in the mirror all the time and thinking about ourselves - how we feel, what we want, how we can get ahead - we turn around and look out the window. There we see the path that God wants us to follow. We see things that we can do for our neighbor. We see ways to put our talents to work for something truly worthwhile, to glorify God and to bring lasting happiness to others. The view out the window is much better than the view in the mirror. 

Alfred Nobel, the man who instituted and endowed the Nobel Peace Prize, was lucky enough to discover the view out the window before he died. He was a Swedish chemist who made his fortune by inventing powerful explosives and licensing the formula to governments to make weapons. One day Nobel's brother died. By accident, a newspaper printed an obituary notice for Alfred instead of the deceased brother. It identified him as the inventor of dynamite who made a fortune by enabling armies to achieve new levels of mass destruction. Nobel had the unique opportunity to read his own obituary in his lifetime and get a glimpse of how he would be remembered: as a merchant of death and destruction. The newspaper's mistake forced him to turn around, to turn away from the mirror and look out the window, to see what impact his life was really having. That's when he decided to change directions. He took his fortune and used it to establish the awards for accomplishments contributing to life rather than death. That's a highly visible case of what it means to repent, to turn around.

Repenting from our sins, trading in our self-centered habits for habits of self-giving, is necessary if we want our friendship with God to grow. But it is necessary for  the rest of our lives to grow.  Every sin, every thorn of selfishness that we leave festering in our hearts, stunts our growth not only as Christians, but also as human beings.

Leonardo Da Vinci learned this lesson while he was painting his famous "Last Supper" in Milan. While he was working on the painting, he had a bitter argument with another painter, an enemy who he had long despised. To vent his anger at this other artist, Da Vinci used the artist's face as a model for the face of Judas Iscariot, the Apostle who betrayed the Lord. Leonardo felt a sense of evil satisfaction in coming up with a humiliation that all his peers would recognize, and that would last though the centuries. As he worked on the faces of the other Apostles, he often tried to paint the face of Jesus, but couldn't make any progress. He advanced steadily in painting all the figures, except that of Jesus, the most important one. He became more and more frustrated and confused. In time he realized what was wrong. His hatred for the other painter was holding him back from finishing the face of Jesus; it kept him from being able to see Jesus clearly. Only after making peace with his fellow painter and repainting the face of Judas was he able to paint the face of Jesus and complete his masterpiece.

We are not made for sin and selfishness. Repentance frees us to see Christ and to become all that he created us to be. Lent is an ideal time “to dig around and manure” the tree of our life so that it may bring forth fruits.

We need to make the best use of the “second chances” God gives us. Our merciful Father always gives us a second chance. The prodigal son, returning to the father, was welcomed as a son, not treated as a slave. The repentant Peter was made the head of the Church. The persecutor Paul was made the apostle to the Gentiles.  During Lent, we, too, are given another chance to repent and return to our Heavenly Father’s love. We are also expected to give others another chance when they ask our forgiveness.

One of the ways the Church encourages us to give repentance its proper place in our life is by making an examination of conscience every night before we go to sleep. Christians have had this habit for centuries.  It's a way to make sure that we never let a sin or a habit of selfishness take root in our hearts and obstruct God's plan for our life.

As Catholic Christians, we are blessed with a very clear, concrete way to repent, as often as we need to. It's called going to confession. Confession opens our souls wide to Christ's grace. It gives him room to work in our lives. In confession Jesus purifies our hearts, heals our wounds, and enlightens our minds. Confession gives us the assurance of God's forgiveness and grace that we need. If each one of us didn't have a need for repentance, God wouldn't have reminded us today about how important repentance is.

We have regular confession times here every Monday morning 9.00 to 9.30; Thursdays 6.00 to 6.40; Saturdays 4.00 to 4.45. Whenever there are no people in the Church I sit in the pew and pray. If you don’t see me in the confessional and am sitting here in the pews you can tap me on the shoulder and ask me to get inside the confessional.

We often ask God to make us happy.  And that's good. Today, he is asking us to make him happy, by repenting, by turning away from our sin and selfishness and turning back into his arms. Let's not disappoint him.

This Sunday (First Sunday of Lent) I am showing a video on Exorcism as the theme of the gospel is Jesus' spiritual war with Satan.

 The video is available at:
https://spiritdailyblog.com/spiritual-warfare/an-exorcist-explains-exorcism-to-young




Next week also I won't post a homily. I have a video message from the Bishop for DPAA.

OT VIII [C]: (Sir 27:4-7; Ps 92:2-3; 13-16; I Cor 15:54-58; Lk 6:39-45)

There’s the story of the conscientious wife who tried very hard to please her ultra-critical husband but failed regularly. He always seemed the most cantankerous at breakfast. If the eggs were scrambled, he wanted them poached; if the eggs were poached, he wanted them scrambled. One morning, with what she thought was a stroke of genius, the wife poached one egg and scrambled the other and placed the plate before him. Anxiously she awaited what surely this time would be his unqualified approval. He peered down at the plate and snorted, “Can’t you do anything right, woman? You’ve scrambled the wrong one!”

In today’s Gospel taken from the Sermon on the Plain given in Luke’s Gospel, Jesus condemns our careless, malicious and rash judgments about the behavior, feelings, motives or actions of others by using the funny examples of one blind man leading another blind man and one man with a log stuck in his eye trying to remove a tiny speck from another’s eye.

We have no right to criticize and judge others: The first reason Jesus gives us is we have no right to criticize unless we ourselves are free of faults. That simply means that we have no right to criticize at all, because “there is so much bad in the best of us and so much good in the worst of us that it is hard for any of us to find fault with the rest of us.” It means that the task of fraternal correction (removing specks, etc.) should not be attempted without prior self-examination, though the disciple need not be completely without imperfections before the process can begin.

A member of a monastic order once committed a fault. A council was called to determine the punishment, but when the monks assembled it was noticed that Father Joseph was not among them. The superior sent someone to say to him, “Come, for everyone is waiting for you. So, Father Joseph got up and went. He took a leaking jug, filled it with water, and carried it with him. When the others saw this they asked, “What is this, father?” The old man said to them, “My sins run out behind me, and I do not see them, and today I am coming to judge the error of another?”

People who are willing to complain about others in their absence are reluctant to do so to their faces. A preacher, capitalizing on this fact, devised an effective way of handling such critics. He kept a special book labeled, “Complaints of Members Against One Another.” When one of them would tell him about some fault of a fellow parishioner, he would say, “Well, here’s my complaint book. I’ll write down what you say, and you can sign your name to it. When I see that person, I’ll take up the matter with him.” That open ledger, and the critic’s awareness of his own faults, always had a restraining effect. Immediately the complainer would exclaim, “Oh, no, I couldn’t sign anything like that!” In 40 years, that book was opened a thousand times, but no entry was ever made. 

1)We need to avoid hypocrisy: Let us acknowledge the hypocrisy we all live every day. Ignoring the glaring faults of our own, we point the finger of accusation, and whisper about them, and say, “How could they?” instead of asking “How could we?” We must look to our own sins first. As a disciple of Jesus Christ, I must be honest with myself. If I have trouble seeing my sins, and my failures, I have to go to Jesus and ask Him to point them out to me through prayer and through His Word.

2) We should stop judging others harshly and unreasonably because 1) No one except God is good enough to judge others because only God sees the whole truth, and only He can read the human heart; hence, only He has the right and authority to judge us. 2) We are often prejudiced in our judgment of others, and total fairness cannot be expected from us. 3) We do not see all the facts, the circumstances or the power of the temptation, which have led a person to do something evil. We need to stop judging a book by its cover. 4) We have no right to judge others because we have the same faults and often to a more serious degree than the person we are judging. St. Philip Neri commented, watching the misbehavior of a drunkard: “There goes Philip but for the grace of God.”

3) Hence, we should leave all judgment to God and practice mercy and forgiveness, remembering the advice of saints: “When you point one finger of accusation at another, three of your fingers point at you.” Let us pay attention to the Jewish rabbi’s advice: “He who judges others favorably will be judged favorably by God.