Twenty Fourth Sunday in Ordinary Time

Link to Mass Readings: http://www.usccb.org/nab/091210.shtml

God will forgive us.

Incredible but true, no matter how much we can’t believe it, His mercy is ours for the asking. The story of the prodigal son is one of the most familiar Gospel readings, and because of that it is one of the easiest to dismiss. We know the son is sinful, and is forgiven because the father is so happy to see him return. We understand that God’s love is infinite, that His forgiveness is there for the asking, etc, etc.

But God really will forgive us.

The story of the prodigal son is always relevant to our hearts. Sometimes we feel like the older son, and want rewards for being “good Christians.” But much, much more often we feel like the younger son sitting in the mud, hungry and wanting to come home. The hardest part is having to ask for forgiveness, whether it is due to pride, shame, fear, or despair.

But God forgives us.

The Lord has made us a promise, that those who believe in him will inherit eternal life. In return He has demanded everything and every day we try to hold something back; but He has created us for salvation. God did not destroy the Israelites because of His promise to Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, and just so He will not destroy us.

This is the Good News: that our sins can be washed away. “A clean heart create for me, O God,/ and a steadfast spirit renew within me.” There are new beginnings. We cannot believe in a God who will always forgive us, because we cannot always forgive others. But here is the victory of salvation, that we will become like the God we worship, and become the city on the hill where the Lord “forgives us our sins, as we forgive those who have sinned against us.”

This week, let us acknowledge who we are. We are sinners, but also sons and daughters who have a home where forgiveness is cheap, because the love between us and our Father is priceless. Our God is He who rejoices during the Sacrament of Reconciliation because that is what is! We as Catholics have learned that confession is serious, and penance must be made with a reverence both severe and respectful to God. But if we truly listened to the gospel, instead of confessing that we had gotten drunk “partying” the night before, we would leave the confessional with a new resolve for jubilee!

We are a backwards and stiff-necked people. We worship the God who turned water into wine, who transforms our earthly lives into ones of Heaven. Let us not fear but anticipate confessing our sins, and be transformed from a sinner in mud to a child feasting at our Lord’s table.