Reflections on the Fourth Sunday of Lent

The Prodigal Father

The day's readings can be found here.

Today’s gospel (Luke 15:11-32) has traditionally been known as the “Parable of the Prodigal Son,” but a number of modern theologians and spiritual writers prefer to call this the “Parable of the Prodigal Father.”  When we look closely at this most beautiful parable that Jesus gives us, we understand a bit more about God’s lavish – almost scandalous – love towards us, His wayward children.

When the son demands his inheritance from the Father, it is a symbol of a person who cuts himself off from God through sin.  In ancient Jewish culture, it was considered a grave offense against the Fourth Commandment to ask for one’s inheritance before one’s father died.  The fact that the son squanders the money in a foreign land in “loose living” adds injury to insult, and as Blessed John Paul II writes, “[It] touches upon every breach of the covenant of love, every loss of grace, and every sin” (Dives in misericordia, 5).  When the son uses up all his inheritance, we are shown analogously the miserable effects of sin: hunger, emptiness, enslavement and despair.  Yet, the young man’s memory of home and his conviction of his father’s love cause him to reflect and resolve to change his life.

The next part of the parable is one of the most moving images of the gospel and is depicted in a vibrant painting by Rembrandt.  When the young man comes home, not only does the Father receive him, but the Father runs toward him – meets him halfway – embraces his son, and covers him with kisses.  “The father of the prodigal son is faithful to this fatherhood, faithful to the love that he had always lavished on his son” (John Paul II, Dives in misericordia, 6).  This is also shown in the great meal, joy and merrymaking that the father initiates at the return of the “squanderer.”

“When God runs towards us, we cannot keep silent, but with St. Paul, we exclaim, Abba, Pater: ‘Father, my Father!’ (Romans 8:15). [. . .] God is waiting for us, like the father in the parable, with open arms, even though we don’t deserve it.  It doesn’t matter how great our debt is.  Just like the prodigal son, all we have to do is open our heart, to be homesick for our Father’s house, to wonder at and rejoice in the gift which God makes us of being able to call ourselves his children, of really being his children, even though our response to him has been so poor” (St. Josemaría Escrivá, Christ Is Passing By, 64).  May this Lent help us to appreciate more and more the extravagant love that our prodigal Father has for each and every one of us.