Ordinary Time - Week 28a
The Marriage Feast
(From Conversation with God, Fernandez Carvajal)Today's liturgy represents salvation in terms of a royal banquet. The Lord invites us to attend the feast. On this mountain, the Lord of hosts will prepare for all people a banquet of rich food, a banquet of fine wines, of food rich and juicy. He will remove the mourning veil covering all peoples. He will destroy Death for ever. The Lord will wipe away the tears from every cheek. From the earliest of days the Prophets had spoken of Heaven using symbols from ordinary life. God himself leads us to this holy mountain.
Today's Responsorial Psalm expresses this reality in moving terms: The Lord is my shepherd. Near restful waters he leads me. He guides me along the right path. If I should walk in the valley of darkness no evil would I fear. You are there with your crook and your staff, with these you give me comfort. Surely goodness and kindness shall follow me all the days of my life. In the Lord's own house shall I dwell for ever and ever.
Jesus is our Shepherd. He invites us to follow him in a thousand different ways. Yet He wants to respect our freedom. This then is the mystery of evil: men and women can refuse God's invitation. The Gospel for today's Mass speaks to us of such a refusal. The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who gave a frost for his son's wedding. According to the customs of the times, the king would have sent his servants to remind the previously invited guests that all was in readiness. The king was waiting for their arrival. And then to the king's surprise the guests declined to attend. Then the king sent more servants to demonstrate his concern. Next he sent some more servants. 'Tell those who have been invited,' he said, 'that I have my banquet all prepared.' God's goodness is shown by the king's insistence and the worthiness of the feast: my oxen and fattened cattle have been slaughtered, everything is ready. Despite all this solicitude, the guests were not interested: one went off to his farm, another to his business, and the rest seized his servants, maltreated them and killed them. In other parables we have seen the Lord asking for what was his. For example, in the parable of the vineyard the Lord allows the tenants to use his land. But in this parable we have the Lord offering a free gift. And it is refused! The Lord offers us the most wonderful things which we only too frequently do not really appreciate. Jesus must have told this parable with deep sorrow. It is the saga of the love of God which has been rejected throughout time.
The invited guests represent those who are totally absorbed in their own activities. They think they have no need of God. When they are advised that God is calling them, they fulfil the parable by reacting with violence. You have a duty to reach those around you, to shake them out of their drowsiness, to open wide new horizons for their selfish, comfortable lives, to make their lives more complicated (in a holy way, that is), to make them forget about themselves and show understanding for the problems of others. If you do not, you are not a good brother to your brothers in the human race. They need that joy and peace which maybe they do not know or have forgotten. Many will in fact respond to our apostolate and reach the banquet in time.