Posted by The WORD in Other Words by Fr Gil Alejandria SVD (Philippines) for Tuesday Week 31 in Ordinary Time
Gospel
Lk 14:15-24
I am sure that many of us are eager to accept invitations to a dinner. It can mean a chance to taste good food, saving up on our food budget, and the pleasure of social interaction with guests like in a wedding feast.
It makes us wonder then why, in today‘s gospel, the invited guests were not so eager to come to the banquet. Did they not like the host? Did the man have a reputation of preparing tasteless food? Or perhaps, they had better things to do than attend wedding banquets.
The parable illustrates God‘s invitation to all of us to partake of the heavenly banquet in His Kingdom. Some of us do not see the importance of accepting the invitation. Some of us find other things more interesting to do.
The parable also alludes to the Jewish people who were called the Chosen People as they were the first to have access to the invitation of God. Their reluctance and hardheadedness opened the way to God‘s extending the invitation to the non—Jews or Gentiles.
This reminds me of what our missionaries in Europe and the USA have observed especially among young people. Religion and faith do not appeal to most of them. Materialism has blinded them to God‘s invitation. Missionaries talk about re-evangelizing and new ways of doing mission work in Western Christian nations.
How do we make the invitation of God heard or noticed by people who are more gadget— centered? God‘s invitation continues to be ignored in these times. This should be a challenge for all of us to make God‘s invitation known and accepted.
Our personal witnessing should show how the acceptance of God‘s invitation makes our lives more meaningful, so as to attract others to our kind of life.
thank you for writing this and posting