(The Nationalist, 26 March 2004)
Jesus once told a parable about a man who had two sons. The younger said to him, ‘Let me have the share of the estate that would come to me’. (Cheeky, selfish brat!) So the father divided the property. The son went abroad and spent it all on debauchery.
Then a famine came, and he had to work feeding pigs, so he decided to return home.
While he was still far off, his father saw him and was moved with pity. He ran to him, hugged him and kissed him. The son said, ‘Father, I have sinned against God and against you, I no longer deserve to be called your son’. But the father told the servants to prepare a celebration.
The elder son asked what was happening, and was told, ‘Your brother has come back and your father has killed the fattened calf for him’. He became angry and refused to go in. He said to his father, ‘All these years I have slaved for you and never disobeyed your orders, but you never offered me even a kid to celebrate with my friends. But, for this son of yours, coming back after swallowing up your property – he and his women – you kill the fattened calf’.
The Father said, ‘My son, you are with me always and all I have is yours. But it was only right that we should celebrate, because your brother was lost and is found’.
I have a question arising from the parable: at what point did the father forgive the son? I put it once to a group of parents. An elderly, patriarchal man who had eleven children, six sons and five daughters (and who told me the girls were just as much trouble as the boys) said, ‘He never forgave him’. I was surprised, and asked him to explain. He said, ‘He never took offence in the first place because he understood him so completely’.
What do you think? I like the interpretation. Saint Thomas Aquinas wrote, ‘God is not disturbed by our sins – except because of the harm they do to us’.
P.S. On a different note, have you heard of the priest preaching on the parable of the Prodigal Son who said that the son spent half the money on wine, women and song – and the other half he wasted!