Fr. Koch: We Rejoice When the Sinner Seeks Reconciliation
March 28, 2025 at 10:44 a.m.
Gospel reflection for March 30, 2025, the Fourth Sunday of Lent.
During the Lenten season, as we seek the mercy and forgiveness of God in a more focused way, we also need to learn the humility that comes with rejoicing in the repentance of others, which leads them also to forgiveness. We need to overcome our tendency to pettiness and self-righteousness, so we can authentically seek reconciliation with those who may have harmed us or taken advantage of us. For every “prodigal son” among us, there are plenty of “older brothers” who are in need of discovering the art of gracious forgiveness, and who can rejoice that God’s mercy can, in time, reach out to all people.
The bitterness and vitriol present within our society and within the church leads to bitterness and resentment. The holding of grudges and the sheer nastiness of others in dialogue that should be, and more often than not was, civil, may be the most egregious sin of our present age.
The young son, so called “the prodigal” represents in some way this tendency at its beginning. He was bored with his life and sought adventure. That is understandable and part of our human nature. He is almost the classic younger son. He took his desire, though, to another level. He asked his father for his share in the estate now – not needing to wait until his father passed from this life. In effect he wanted to be done with his family and make his own way and forge his own identity.
He failed.
As a Jewish person his life had sunk to its lowest possible point – working on a pig farm – leaving him in a perpetual state of being unclean and alienated even from his own people.
His return home is a precarious one. Pious reflection aside the young man has shown no remorse and indeed seems to be playing the part of a penitent one, as with much embarrassment he returns to his father, seeking to live a better life than he has with the pig farmer.
Did he know or expect that his father would reconcile with him to the fullest extent, or was he just hoping to get his foot in the door?
This is a judgment that we, as we listen to the parable, are forced to make. How authentic is his desire to reconcile with the family he abandoned? Could he have expected the response of the father.
As a child knows the parent, even more so, does a parent know the child.
Here the father expected the return of the son – did he expect him to fail or did he hope the son would return with a flare of success, showing the wisdom of his decision. I suppose that, like the father, we can hope it was the latter, knowing that it was probably the former.
The father startled the son and even interrupted his canned speech of atonement – the father immediately and without hesitation or question, not only celebrated with a great feast, but inherited the son.
The elder son, the one who probably in the depth of his heart both wished he had the courage to do what the younger did, and thereby resented him even more deeply, now presents as the petty and spiteful man that he is.
We are torn between two extremes in this parable. A father who is too ready and willing to forgive and may be taken advantage of by a son who is conniving and greedy, and a brother who is resentful and bitter about the reestablishment of his brother to the family and is at the same time resentful and bitter about his own life choices and his father’s treatment of him as well.
This parable leaves us with many questions and challenges.
At the end, though, we realize that the father and the younger son have, for their own reasons, made the better choice.
The younger son will stew in his bitterness and lack of forgiveness while the others celebrate, knowing yet they have much work to do on the path to reconciliation.
Father Garry Koch is pastor of St. Benedict Parish, Holmdel.
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Gospel reflection for March 30, 2025, the Fourth Sunday of Lent.
During the Lenten season, as we seek the mercy and forgiveness of God in a more focused way, we also need to learn the humility that comes with rejoicing in the repentance of others, which leads them also to forgiveness. We need to overcome our tendency to pettiness and self-righteousness, so we can authentically seek reconciliation with those who may have harmed us or taken advantage of us. For every “prodigal son” among us, there are plenty of “older brothers” who are in need of discovering the art of gracious forgiveness, and who can rejoice that God’s mercy can, in time, reach out to all people.
The bitterness and vitriol present within our society and within the church leads to bitterness and resentment. The holding of grudges and the sheer nastiness of others in dialogue that should be, and more often than not was, civil, may be the most egregious sin of our present age.
The young son, so called “the prodigal” represents in some way this tendency at its beginning. He was bored with his life and sought adventure. That is understandable and part of our human nature. He is almost the classic younger son. He took his desire, though, to another level. He asked his father for his share in the estate now – not needing to wait until his father passed from this life. In effect he wanted to be done with his family and make his own way and forge his own identity.
He failed.
As a Jewish person his life had sunk to its lowest possible point – working on a pig farm – leaving him in a perpetual state of being unclean and alienated even from his own people.
His return home is a precarious one. Pious reflection aside the young man has shown no remorse and indeed seems to be playing the part of a penitent one, as with much embarrassment he returns to his father, seeking to live a better life than he has with the pig farmer.
Did he know or expect that his father would reconcile with him to the fullest extent, or was he just hoping to get his foot in the door?
This is a judgment that we, as we listen to the parable, are forced to make. How authentic is his desire to reconcile with the family he abandoned? Could he have expected the response of the father.
As a child knows the parent, even more so, does a parent know the child.
Here the father expected the return of the son – did he expect him to fail or did he hope the son would return with a flare of success, showing the wisdom of his decision. I suppose that, like the father, we can hope it was the latter, knowing that it was probably the former.
The father startled the son and even interrupted his canned speech of atonement – the father immediately and without hesitation or question, not only celebrated with a great feast, but inherited the son.
The elder son, the one who probably in the depth of his heart both wished he had the courage to do what the younger did, and thereby resented him even more deeply, now presents as the petty and spiteful man that he is.
We are torn between two extremes in this parable. A father who is too ready and willing to forgive and may be taken advantage of by a son who is conniving and greedy, and a brother who is resentful and bitter about the reestablishment of his brother to the family and is at the same time resentful and bitter about his own life choices and his father’s treatment of him as well.
This parable leaves us with many questions and challenges.
At the end, though, we realize that the father and the younger son have, for their own reasons, made the better choice.
The younger son will stew in his bitterness and lack of forgiveness while the others celebrate, knowing yet they have much work to do on the path to reconciliation.
Father Garry Koch is pastor of St. Benedict Parish, Holmdel.