Lk 15:1-3.11-32 (15:1-32)

 

Value of imperfect uniqueness

 

A God in search of the lost and unequal, to expand our life

(Lk 15:1-10)

 

Why does Jesus speak of Joy in reference to the one sheep?

Says the Tao Tê Ching (x): "Preserve the One by dwelling in the two souls: are you able to keep them apart?"

Even in the spiritual journey, Jesus is careful not to propose a dictated or planned universalism, as if his were an ideal model, "for the purpose of homogenisation" (Brothers All No.100).

The type of Communion that the Lord proposes to us does not aim at "a one-dimensional uniformity that seeks to eliminate all differences and traditions in a superficial search for unity".

Because "the future is not 'monochromatic' but if we have the courage, it is possible to look at it in the variety and diversity of the contributions that each one can make. How much our human family needs to learn to live together in harmony and peace without us all being equal!" (from an Address to Young People in Tokyo, November 2019).

 

Although the piety and hope of the representatives of official religiosity was founded on a structure of human, ethnic, cultural securities and a vision of the Mystery consolidated by a great tradition, Jesus crumbles all predictability.

In the Son, God is revealed no longer as exclusive property, but as the Power of Love that forgives the marginalised and lost: saving and creating, liberating. And through the disciples, he unfolds his Face that recovers, breaks down the usual barriers, calls out to miserable multitudes.

It seems an impossible utopia to realise in concrete terms (today of the health and global crisis), but it is the sense of the handover to the Church, called to become an incessant prod of the Infinite and ferment of an alternative world, for integral human development:

"Let us dream as one humanity, as wayfarers made of the same human flesh, as children of this same earth that is home to us all, each with the richness of his faith or convictions, each with his own voice, all brothers!" (FT no.8).

 

Through an absurd question (phrased rhetorically) Jesus wants to awaken the conscience of the 'righteous': there is a counterpart of us that supposes of itself, very dangerous, because it leads to exclusion, to abandonment.

Instead, inexhaustible Love seeks. And it finds the imperfect and restless.

The swamp of stagnant energy that is generated by accentuating boundaries does not make anyone grow: it locks in the usual positions and leaves everyone to make do or lose themselves. Out of self-interested disinterest - that impoverishes everyone.

This made the creative virtues fall into despair.

And it plunged those who were outside the circle of the elect - anterior ones who had nothing superior. In fact, Luke portrays them as utterly incapable of beaming with human joy at the progress of others.

Calculating, acting and conforming - the leaders (fundamentalist or sophisticated) are ignorant of reality, and use religion as a weapon.

Instead, God is at the antipodes of the fake sterilised - or disembodied thinking - and looking for the one who wanders shakily, easily becomes disoriented, loses his way. 

Sinful yet true, therefore more disposed to genuine Love. This is why the Father is searching for the insufficient.

The person who is so limpid and spontaneous - even if weak - hides his best part and vocational richness precisely behind his apparently detestable sides. Perhaps that he himself does not appreciate.

This is the principle of Redemption that astounds and makes interesting our often distracted paths, conducted by trial and error - in Faith, however, generating self-esteem, credit, fullness and joy.

 

The commitment of the purifier and the impetus of the reformer are 'trades' that seemingly oppose each other, but are easy... and typical of those who think that the things to be challenged and changed are always outside themselves.

For example, in mechanisms, in general rules, in the legal framework, in worldviews, in formal (or histrionic) aspects instead of the craft of the concrete particular good; and so on.

They seem to be excuses not to look inside oneself and get involved, not to meet one's deepest states in all aspects and not only in the guidelines. And to recover or cheer up individuals who are concretely lost, sad, in all dark and difficult sides.

But God is at the antipodes of sterilised mannerists or fake idealists, and in search of the insufficient: he who wanders and loses his way. Sinful yet true, therefore more disposed to genuine Love.

The transparent and spontaneous person - even if weak - hides his best part and vocational richness precisely behind the apparently detestable aspects (perhaps which he himself does not appreciate).

So let us ask for solutions to the mysterious, unpredictable interpersonal energies that come into play; from within things.Without interfering with or opposing ideas of the past or future that we do not see. Rather by possessing its soul, its spontaneous drug.

This is the principle of Salvation that astounds and makes interesting our paths [often distracted, led by trial and error] - ultimately generating self-esteem, credit and joy.

 

The idea that the Most High is a notary or prince of a forum, and makes a clear distinction between righteous and transgressors, is caricature.

After all, a life of the saved is not one's own making, nor is it exclusive possession or private ownership - which turns into duplicity.

It is not the squeamish attitude, nor the cerebral attitude, that unites one to Him. The Father does not blandish suppliant friendships, nor does He have outside interests.

He rejoices with everyone, and it is need that draws Him to us. So let us not be afraid to let Him find us and bring us back (v.5)... to His house, which is our house.

If there is a loss, there will be a finding, and this is no loss to anyone - except to the envious enemies of freedom (v.2).

For the LORD is not pleased with marginalisation, nor does he intend to extinguish the smoking lamp.

Jesus does not come to point the finger at the bad times, but to make up for them, by leveraging intimate involvement. Invincible force of faithfulness.

This is the style of a Church with a Sacred Heart, lovable, elevated and blessed.

[What attracts one to participate and express oneself is to feel understood, restored to full dignity - not condemned].

Carlo Carretto said: 'It is by feeling loved, not criticised, that man begins his journey of transformation'.

 

As the encyclical Fratelli Tutti emphasises again:

Jesus - our Engine and Motive - "had an open heart, which made the dramas of others its own" (n.84).

And he adds as an example of our great Tradition:

"People can develop certain attitudes which they present as moral values: fortitude, sobriety, industriousness and other virtues. But in order to properly direct the acts [...] we must also consider to what extent they realise a dynamism of openness and union [...] Otherwise we will only have appearances'.

"St Bonaventure explained that the other virtues, without charity, strictly speaking do not fulfil the commandments as God intends them" (n.91).

 

In sects or one-sidedly inspired groups, human and spiritual riches are deposited in a secluded place, so they grow old and debased.

In the assemblies of the children, on the other hand, they are shared: they grow and communicate; by multiplying, they green up, for universal benefit.

 

 

To internalise and live the message:

 

What attracts you to the Church? In comparisons with the top of the class, do you feel judged or adequate?

Do you feel the Love that saves, even if you remain uncertain?

 

 

Mutual pride, no discouragement

(Lk 15:11-32)

 

I had never understood what God's Mercy had to do with my dignity: how come the pose of the sons [who sooner or later return] had to be the one depicted by Rembrandt - one standing, the other kneeling?

If the young man runs away because the atmosphere set up by the pretensions of the elder brothers is unbearable, should he also shave his head and stand in penance - hoping at best to be an object of compassion?

No, otherwise the master of the house would not have clothed his runaway son with cassock and ring, i.e. appointed him - foolishly - as the new head of administration of the house. As if everything were regular.

 

In the Year of the Father, I admired the chromatic artistry of the work now in the Hermitage, but the composition and sense of the figures did not sit well with me.

Worn feet, unserviceable footwear, I could even understand them. But not the stance of a bumbling man in search of an absurd and forced empathy.

The suit torn in several places, without a dignified belt - perhaps sold out of necessity - and replaced by a miserable scullion's lanyard, all right.

But the small sword hanging from his right hip seemed to me to illustrate that despite his disgrace and shaved slave head, the young man had not lost his cynical opportunism.

In my spiritual grammar at the time, however, the bald head already alluded to the idea of the unborn child.

In the seminary I realised that beyond events, we are unceasingly generated as fresh and clean creatures; never humiliated.

The emphasis of this Gospel in the penitential liturgies tinged with ambiguity for me: the protagonist is the yielding Father, not the lopsided actions of the son who runs away and comes back out of calculation (and will run away again).

Tapered, strong hands: only His are so complete.

In Liturgy classes I had also learnt the meaning of 'red': royalty capable of rewinding the lost; colour in unison with the tenderness of flesh and its living generosity.

And it is all carnal in its stooping down to straddle [falling on the neck: thus the Greek text] the rediscovered and reborn.It is not a notary's gesture that finds, but one that shortens the distance and removes the dishonour of the rifts, unbridgeable by Perfection.

It justifies: it creates the just where there is no justice.

The opposite of the eldest son, upright and certain of his give and take; not solicitous to lift anyone up, let alone the weak.

He has a gaze that only sees the wretched on the outside, does not grasp the scene from within.

The elder brother remains rigid and indignant: no symphonies and choruses, but only realises his efficient service.

And he even whines, because in everything he imagines he has to ask permission, even to be able to party (v.29): the infantilism of the obedient... formalist and calibrated.

 

To the official icon of the Year of the Father I preferred the focus of Andrea Palma's painting at the Galleria Borghese - albeit less aesthetically creative and fascinating.

I understood further by delving into the text. And I became aware of the biblical meaning of a suppressed commandment [but a point of strength and distinction in the approach to God, a specificity of evangelical spirituality]: "Thou shalt not make thyself an image" (Ex 20:3-4ff; Deut 5:8ff).

The ancient precept supposes that representations detract from the Logos and the You-for-you, depersonalising the relationship with the Father: they perhaps deviate and confuse it.

It is precisely the most attractive features, descriptive or decorative, that are sometimes able to dampen the disruptive force of the missionary Word, with its raw and biting tone, not at all intimist.

[In sacred art, especially Latin figurative art has pretensions that dwarf the impulse of the Text, not infrequently normalised according to 'cultural' and moral clichés].

 

The son does not return because he is intimately repentant, but out of opportunism and sheer hunger - and prepares a speech that might convince the parent. Indeed, it has moved many generations.

The Father prevents him from finishing the ready-made sentence (vv.18-19), precisely at the point where the son intended to express himself as a servant put to wages (vv.21-22). This is the whole game.

Thanks to his radical experience in the journey of faith, Andrea Palma, the lesser-rated but religious artist of the friars of St. Dominic, sensed what all traditional iconography - captured by clichés - had never grasped.

The Recall of the famous parable is not for the irritated, uninhibited and spendthrift young man, then repentant in pretense - but for the 'first-born' (vv.2-3) who still kidnap the Gratis.

The Father had shown respect for conscience and even yielded, but with a firm gesture he does not allow them to kneel.

He decisively prevents us from making the only mistake he really cares to avoid, because we would ruin not only the moral character of one section of existence, but the whole life of our neighbour as well - by becoming ridiculous, disassociated and hostile like the 'greater ones'.

In the sight of God we are equal, not beneath. He does not humiliate, he does not discredit, he does not demand that we bow down before Him or some guru who imposes external artifices.

It was good to know that - despite the sullen looks of the major gendarmes - I too would always fall on my feet.

Merciful Father and prodigal son: the pride will be mutual.

 

 

No disheartened

 

Love is a Feast, not an exchange of favours.

So we are not marked for life, for He knows that our paradoxical escapes are dictated by a need (or legitimate fixation): to breathe.

And we must be proud of ourselves.

Inside the house there is no freedom, because the 'big brothers' are sometimes unbearable.

They impose performance, they understand everything, they control every comma; they imagine that everyone should be paid according to merit, pace, ability, effort, overtime hours, (manners and) sirs.

Arcane about everything, they whine only because they imagine that one must ask permission from authority even to rejoice in life and make noise for free.

Their 'must and obey' kills Tenderness.

The Father, on the other hand, prevents us from feeling degraded, so he does not want to hear the list of transgressions that the 'pure' one does not know but imagines and foolishly punctuates, because he represses them within and secretly cultivates them [identifying them with pleasure!]

He does not want us to make the mistake that ruins the whole of life and not just a few stretches of the path: to feel salaried.

In this way, he educates us to let good prevail over evil, without demeaning anyone.

 

Everywhere we find a master who exploits. And even if we only return home out of calculation, God prevents us from getting down on our knees.

We recite the Lord's Prayer standing: with Him we are always valiant face to face, and He likes "symphonies and choirs".

 

 

For an interiorisation of discernment

 

Although the Father is not understood by any of His intimates, He stands out by remaining yielding without any demeanour.Not because he is good-natured and decent, but wise: the life of both sons would not be advanced by exasperating their fulcrums, denying forces, poles, sides of the soul, but by integrating these powers and taking them as a supplement. By recognising and coalescing them.

The famous parable is unsuccessful due to the fact that the certain conclusion of the plot does not and must not exist.

The two of them [who are each of us, at the same time, in our innermost selves] will continue the usual indecent story, that is, being in and out of the house.

All this in a brazen manner. But then they will know the many slopes of themselves - even in opposition.

 

This is perhaps the most relevant aspect: based on the different motions of the soul and happenings, everyone is called to his or her own (unpredictable) synthesis.

It can vary not only in situation, but also with respect to different ages, in the spirit.

Gradually the solution makes its way, but it does not emerge in the regularity of decent events - from alienated women and men.

Elder and younger son are co-present aspects in each.

It is a paradoxical condition, but one that makes it possible to be richer: e.g. not always neurotic, narrow-minded, stressful and busy like the eldest son; not only wild, epidermic and impulsive like the youngest.

Change and variegated calibre are resources that trigger both pauses and leaps forward, and the Father knows this.

God wants us complete: capable of imagining and thinking, but also solid.

Whereas a master father would place us where he needs us and it would be enough for him if we were servile servants of the boss.

So we would be good and placed where he puts us for his needs. 

Civil servants... without that ductile cooperation that opens up varied experience and a correlative added value - able to elaborate and to be.

Thus and in the Exodus of each character.

Evolving the polyhedron of personality, and growing in freedom; towards an ever more convinced alliance and integration, and its fulfilment in Love.

 

In stagnating situations, the drive of unconditional understanding and friendship that makes the weak strong act as an unsurpassable therapy - an incentive to continue the journey.

In Journey, they are relationships that accept and welcome, accommodate and bless contrasts (in the case of the two, reliability and fantasy, for example).

By letting the conflicting slopes surface, all dispositions and talents... both better self-knowledge and external relationships, become territories of new expression.

Expansion of life, by innate plastic energies, which make the soul rich and confirm [or challenge and denounce, in the case of conformism] personal inclinations.

Spiritual guides linked to customary and commonplace religiosity tend to make us deny contradictions. But this cuts the person back, saps his strength and impoverishes the even intimate situation, annihilating his normal drives.

And it inoculates the idea that God himself is a reductionist totem, not the Source, the exuberance of life and the platform of Being that we experience in particular essences.

Not infrequently, self-righteous religiosity reduces life in the Spirit to trifles, muddling us in puddles.

Conversely, communion with the Father enjoys perceiving the power of full Wholeness, which makes day and night meet.

 

The soul only feels fit if the magma of conflicting powers that it perceives and grasps are recognised, blessed.

The many nuances allow us to measure ourselves against different unities, and to be aware of opposing sides - from which intermediate sides will germinate.

Neglecting to welcome them is fruitless: we could not deal unconditionally with the facets of reality and the multitude of characters we carry within.

They are forces that come to our aid, recuperate, complement, according to events or personal sensitivity.

If we remain enclosed in an idol, in a chiselled idea, in a task, in a role, in manners, in even hyperactive and respectable, or faux-transgressive, mannerisms, to be recited, we would lose the opportunity and the capacity to recreate ourselves, the Church, the world.

Evangelisation itself must be able to take on unforeseen variations; so must missionary activity, which often goes hand in hand with an enterprising soul, full of discrepancies that open up the search for dialogue and the risk of empathy; going beyond the so-called 'charisma'.

 

Contradiction dwells in each of us and the merciful Father does not call anyone to put on inner or outer straitjackets.

He does not intend to absorb the life of our subtleties and nuances, nor does he intend to reduce the co-presence of faces.

He knows that each person's evolution is matched by a varied experiential language; capable in its time of combining ancient richness, even momentary personal inclinations, and unexpected novelties.If we deny the manifold universe of the soul and the multitude of its antinomies, idioms and co-present characters - like the two sons who are both contradictory but ultimately complementary - we would never have all the perspectives available for a growth of the life-wave and for evolution in the expressive force of Faith.

 

Says the Tao Tê Ching (xix): 'There is more to be observed: show yourself simple and keep yourself raw'.

In the Work of the Spirit, Occasions of Wealth for all, and... no one disheartened.

All now free. How wonderful, such a monstrance! A living Body of Christ that smells of Sharing!

This is the beautiful and regal awareness that levelled and made credible every content of the Proclamation (vv.1-2).

Henceforth, the distinction between believers or non-believers will be much deeper than between pure and impure, performers or not.

A whole other carat - and principle of a saved existence.

 

Christ also calls, welcomes and redeems the unhinged son and the precise one (in us) that is the more rubricistic - or worn-out - side of our personality.

Even our unbearable or rightly hated character (the rigid one and the distracted one).

It will even make them flourish: they will become indispensable and winning aspects of future testimony.

Says the Tao Tê Ching [XLV]: 'Great uprightness is like sinuousness, great skill is like ineptitude, great eloquence is like stammering'.

 

Merciful Father and prodigal son: the Fierceness will be mutual.

 

 

To internalise and live the message:

 

When do I find myself hypocritical and narrow-hearted? When do I realise instead that I am the protagonist of what the Father shares?