24th Sunday Ordinary (C-1)/ The Prodigal Son
  EX 32:7-14/Ps 51/1 Tim 1:12-17 Lk 15:1-32
  Introduction
 

          Some people enjoy having pet. I myself, I love dogs. The problem is sometimes you become so attach to it that unconsciously there develop a certain kind of psycho emotional relationship between the pet and the owner. When the dog is sad and can’t eat the owner worries. The pets becomes so part of you that when it dies you feel that something in you dies also. The relationship between the shepherd and the sheep is far more than just an owner and a pet. It is more than that; it becomes like a “son” to him.

  
  Background
 
  1. Shepherds will do all they can to find lost sheep. Many of the flocks were communal flocks, belonging not to individuals, but to villages. There would be two or three shepherds in charge. Those whose flocks were safe would arrive home on time and bring news that one shepherd was still out on the mountain side searching for a sheep which was lost. The shepherd was personally responsible for the sheep. If a sheep was lost, the shepherd must at least bring home the remains to show how it had died. These shepherds were experts at tracking and could follow the straying sheep’s footprints for miles across the hills. The whole village would be upon the watch, and when in the distance, they saw the shepherd coming home with the lost sheep across his shoulders, there would raise from the whole community a shout of joy and of thanksgiving.

  2. The coin that was lost does not sound very much of value but in Palestine it could mean a whole day’s wage for a regular working man. For a family who was living below poverty line, losing a coin could mean a family who will not eat for a day. There could be another romantic reason for the coin. The mark of a married woman was a head-dress of ten silver coins linked together by a silver chain. For a married woman to loss even one of these coins would be the same as losing her wedding ring. If that head dress coins was a symbol of being a wife and a mother, she will rejoice finding it, as if finding a lost member of her family.

  3. The “younger son” was a symbol for the gentiles and the sinners. The gentiles were from far away countries worshiping different gods. The sinners, like tax collectors, were considered the children of Yahweh but spent their lives in an immoral and corrupt way of life.

    The “elder son” was a symbol for the Jews. They believed that they were pious and clean; and faithful to the law, so they were the ones who had the right to inherit all the properties of the Father. They can not reconcile the fact that the Father has accepted the gentiles and the sinners as part of his own family, equal to them.
    The “Father” is Yahweh. He is a very merciful Father who does not mind how sinful we are. He always waits for our return. He loves both of his sons, the “pious” one’s and “the sinners” a like. He simply wants all people back into his fold, into his heavenly home.
  
  Reflection:  
 
  1. We used to call the last passage, “the parable of the prodigal son.” St Luke was able to enumerate all the sins of the younger son starting from inappropriate demand for all his inheritance while his father was still alive, down to the every detail on how he spent all his money in vices and prostitutes. But the turning point at the end was the touching one. It was the moment when he stopped, looked at the pigs, and realized how miserable his life had been. Sin drags us down to our lowest dignity and places us into a most embarrassing position. When he felt a deep sense of remorse he returned to his father and said his most sincere sorry (sense of sin). He wanted to be treated only as a servant, but the Father restored his original dignity as a son. Sometime we have to feel the sadness and the emptiness within our hearts, in order to stand up and to go back to the Father, say we are sorry. (Confession) Only then we can really feel that loving embrace of our merciful Father - again

  2. Lately, there are a lot of theologians who avoid calling this passage the “Prodigal son” but rather, they want to call it the parable of the “loving Father” For them the focus of the whole story must be on the unconditional mercy of the Father, and not so much on the sinfulness of the son. We all know that we are all sinners and there is nothing new and exciting about it. It was the undying mercy of Father that makes the difference. If so happen that the son came back and did not find “an open arm” and a “welcoming door” then the whole story of the son’s conversion becomes meaningless and could even turn to a terrible end. Whenever I hear confession I am not so much interested with the sins of the penitent, it was already done anyway. My concern is how to give the absolution in a clear and slow manner so that the penitent will feel merciful God is.

  3. For me, this parable could also be called the “unforgiving brother” This elder brother was supposed to be the good guy in the story. But let us look closely into his “real” personality: We have not heard any protest from him when his father divided all his properties into two. He allowed it to happen because he was also interested with the other half. When he came home and learned that his brother arrived and was accepted again as a son, he got mad because he might have a right (again) for the remaining property the father (which suppose to belong only to him.) When he tried to argue with his father why he needs to kill the fatted calf for the return of his prodigal brother, and why he did not even offer a small lamb for his friends? But the Father disagreed. The father knew that he can take any of lambs anytime because he was a member of the family, and he would inherent them all anyway. The truth is; he simply doesn’t want to touch any of the animals because he wants to take them all. He was the one who doesn’t want to offer even a one lamb even for his own very friends. The worst part is when he can not forgive his own brother. If the Father who lost all his property - can forgive, then why can’t he accept his own brother back, who did not even do any harm to him anyway. When I realized how bad this elder brother was, I do not know who deserve to be called “prodigal son.”
 
  Conclusion  
 

         If the house of the father is the symbol for heaven, then we have to ask ourselves: who was the one who found himself inside the house at the end of the story? Ironically, it was the young prodigal son. Yes he was a sinner but came back and said sorry, then he celebrates the beauty of the God’s mercy inside his heavenly kingdom. The elder stays outside, not because he was not accepted to enter the house but because he refused to enter the house. He thinks he was the only one who was good, and therefore he was the only one who deserved to be in his father’s house. If ever he will see any sinners in it, he would rather stay outside, and will never dare to not to enter in it. Oftentimes, our own damnation is our own choice. Salvation is not basically a fruit of man’s effort, it is a grace, a gift from God, offered to all men. Those who believe that they earned it, and they deserve it; because they are good, might sometimes find themselves outside the door.
            It is not a question of how many sins we have committed, nor how grave our sins are.  It is rather our own humility and sincerity of saying sorry, that matters most..