Homily The interesting thing about our gospel reading today about the prodigal son is that it is such a human story. Many human emotions and desires that we know so well are clearly set out.
The so-called prodigal son wants to leave home, wants to go his own way, and wants independence from the family. This is something most of us have experienced and it is an entirely natural and even laudable thing.
Where the prodigal son goes wrong is that he uses his newfound independence to reject the values which his parents had spent so much effort trying to help him to acquire. Perhaps he felt life at home was unnecessarily restrictive, he wanted freedom and the ability to make his own choices.
This desire to leave home and to set up on one’s own is absolutely normal and is indeed necessary. But unfortunately it is often motivated by naive assumptions and wrong-headedness. Frequently during the teenage years children feel that the parents no longer love them and that they are being unnecessarily restrictive. The young people don’t recognise that changes are actually going on within themselves and it is not that their parents are acting any different to normal.
‘You’re cramping my style,’ or something like it is a phrase we have perhaps often heard on the lips of our children. But, of course, it was on our own lips long before it came to be on theirs. It is part of the human condition that we feel the need to make our own mistakes. Frequently this is the only way we can learn.
The task of the parent is to give the child such a good grounding in life and in Christian values so that when the break occurs the mistakes that the child necessarily makes enable them to learn but without being such spectacular mistakes that they ruin their lives in the process. Easy for me to say, but not so easy to do.
When I first looked at the readings for today and saw that we had this text about the prodigal son, I thought how singularly inappropriate it was for Mother’s Day the celebration with which it coincides this year. But on further reflection I came round to thinking perhaps it was quite an appropriate choice because the story is about the importance of good parenting, even though all the characters in it are men.
And in the modern world there are just as many prodigal daughters as prodigal sons. I used to meet a lot of them when I was chaplain in a women’s prison; much more than you might think.
The story is about good parenting. It is about the parent giving the child a good grounding in moral values in a suitably protected environment but also, when the appropriate time comes, about giving the child the necessary freedom to make their own life choices.
And, of course, it is about being there for them, always ready to welcome them back into the family when things go wrong. I don’t want to put down fathers in any way but perhaps on this Mother’s Day we ought to note that there are surely at least as many, indeed probably far more, mothers who fit this role of being there ready to forgive.
In our society, the mother is frequently the one who longs for the return of the prodigal, the one who exercises forgiveness more readily. Although things are changing and the balance is being rectified I suppose it is still true to say that the greater part of the burden of parenting falls on the mother: The greater part of the burden, but also the greater part of the joy.
On this special day dedicated to mothers we acknowledge the debt we owe them and pray that they may experience in full measure the reward of their labours and anxieties on our behalf.
The story is about good parenting but it is also about being a good child. It tells us about the one who went off gadding around doing his own thing and wallowing in a life of debauchery and how he eventually came to his senses.
The important thing that this young man learnt was that there is no shame in returning home. He had the courage to make that decision and not to cut himself off from his family even more.
The older brother also features in the story and there is a lot to be learnt from him. Staying at home and being dutiful is one thing, but to do so with a hardness in one’s heart is quite another. He needed to learn to be unselfish and generous and not to feel that his compliance had somehow earned him credit.
In some ways this brother, although apparently obedient and dutiful, was actually more selfish than the prodigal son. And we might be tempted to judge him more harshly because his selfishness was hidden.
Our story is, however, primarily about reconciliation. It is, after all, a parable. It is a parable of the limitless love God has for us whether we identify with the prodigal son or the selfish older brother.
God is the very best of parents; he is the very best of fathers and mothers. He is constantly there for us. His heart is ever open and full of love. He sees all we do and his unseen hand protects us from our worst excesses.
He gives us all the independence we crave for and need. He opens his treasury and gives us more than our share when we want to launch out on our own. And he is there waiting to welcome us into his arms whenever we are ready to return to him.
To my mind the most beautiful line in the story is the one that says: While he was still a long way off, his father saw him and was moved with pity.
This describes perfectly the relationship God has with us. Even when we are far off he is there waiting for us, waiting to welcome us. His heart is moved with pity for the condition we have allowed ourselves to get into. He waits with longing for us to return and to experience his forgiveness.
In the Church Christ has given us the sacrament of reconciliation, that wonderful sacrament which expresses God’s love and forgiveness for us. To take the words of today’s Gospel, it is only right that we should celebrate and rejoice because in the sacrament of reconciliation we who are dead because of sin are restored to life, we who are lost are found.
There could be no better conclusion to the homily today than to quote the words of St Paul from our second reading: The appeal that we make in Christ’s name is this: be reconciled to God.