Who are the real sinners?

Luke 15:1-3,11-32

The tax collectors and the sinners were all seeking the company of Jesus to hear what he had to say, and the Pharisees and the scribes complained. ‘This man’ they said ‘welcomes sinners and eats with them.’ So he spoke this parable to them:

  ‘A man had two sons. The younger said to his father, “Father, let me have the share of the estate that would come to me.” So the father divided the property between them. A few days later, the younger son got together everything he had and left for a distant country where he squandered his money on a life of debauchery.

  ‘When he had spent it all, that country experienced a severe famine, and now he began to feel the pinch, so he hired himself out to one of the local inhabitants who put him on his farm to feed the pigs. And he would willingly have filled his belly with the husks the pigs were eating but no one offered him anything. Then he came to his senses and said, “How many of my father’s paid servants have more food than they want, and here am I dying of hunger! I will leave this place and go to my father and say: Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you; I no longer deserve to be called your son; treat me as one of your paid servants.” So he left the place and went back to his father.

  ‘While he was still a long way off, his father saw him and was moved with pity. He ran to the boy, clasped him in his arms and kissed him tenderly. Then his son said, “Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I no longer deserve to be called your son.” But the father said to his servants, “Quick! Bring out the best robe and put it on him; put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet. Bring the calf we have been fattening, and kill it; we are going to have a feast, a celebration, because this son of mine was dead and has come back to life; he was lost and is found.” And they began to celebrate.

  ‘Now the elder son was out in the fields, and on his way back, as he drew near the house, he could hear music and dancing. Calling one of the servants he asked what it was all about. “Your brother has come” replied the servant “and your father has killed the calf we had fattened because he has got him back safe and sound.” He was angry then and refused to go in, and his father came out to plead with him; but he answered his father, “Look, all these years I have slaved for you and never once disobeyed your orders, yet you never offered me so much as a kid for me to celebrate with my friends. But, for this son of yours, when he comes back after swallowing up your property – he and his women – you kill the calf we had been fattening.”

 ‘The father said, “My son, you are with me always and all I have is yours. But it was only right we should celebrate and rejoice, because your brother here was dead and has come to life; he was lost and is found.”’

Food for thought!

The best way to approach this parable is to look at what triggered it in the first place. The gospel says, "The tax collectors and the sinners were all seeking the company of Jesus to hear what he had to say, and the Pharisees and the scribes complained. ‘This man’ they said ‘welcomes sinners and eats with them.’ So he spoke this parable to them."

What triggered this story are two kinds of people that were in the company of Jesus, the sinners and the religious (Pharisees and scribes). The sinners were in the company of Jesus in order to listen to him and learn from him. The Pharisees and scribes were in the company of Jesus, not to listen to what he had to say, but to criticize him, to complain, as the Gospel put it.

We also have these people, who seem to be our friends, who even keep are always physically close to us, but who emotionally and spiritually are very far away; people who criticise us. Have you ever noticed that all our friends were once our friends? In other words, only those who once knew you, only those who once were your friends, can be your enemies. Enemy means old friends that turned their back on us.

Please, note that in today's gospel reading, it isn't the so called sinners that are complaining, but the so called religious people. Note again that of the two sons, the one complaining is not the young son but the older son, who was always in the company of Jesus. This is how be phrased his complaint: “Look, all these years I have slaved for you and never once disobeyed your orders, yet you never offered me so much as a kid for me to celebrate with my friends. But, for this son of yours, when he comes back after swallowing up your property – he and his women – you kill the calf we had been fattening.”

What does this teach us? It warns us, we the religious, we the Christians, we the Catholics, we who seem to be close to Jesus, that we may be the furthest people from the Lord. Like the Pharisees in the company of Jesus, like the elder son always in the company of the Father, we may be the real sinners. Those people we label as sinners may not be as much sinners as we think.