I Will Go to My Father!

Saturday, March 22, 2025

Mic 7:14-15, 18-20; Lk 15:1-3, 11-32

In today’s Gospel, Jesus highlights the Father’s love through the character of his two sons. 

Before making an analysis, we need to evaluate the nature of the two sons as Jesus himself shows. 

1.Sefl-righteousness typifies the older son. He reveals it both in his retort to his father and in his not entering the house of celebration, as if to mean that he will have no part in the welcoming of a sinner who squandered his father’s property. The real problem with the older son is that he wants his father to feel the same toward his prodigal brother, without letting his father be who he truly is. By being resentful toward his father and conditioning his response toward his brother, the older son betrays himself and the evil of his self-righteous attitude. 

2. Without any justification, as Jesus himself shows, the younger son proves to be prodigal both in his manner and behaviour. He never wanted to share his life with his father or brother, and that is what is represented by his demand, ‘Father, give me the share of your estate that should come to me.’ We must note that both in his prodigality and repentance, it is the younger son who behaves more like his father’s rightful son. Though he squanders his father’s property, when he comes to his senses, he returns to his father with no hesitation.

Here, Jesus wants us to pay attention to the nuances of the parable.  

1.Because his father was magnanimous and his brother was prodigal, the older son thought that his anger was just toward both. However, he failed to do that from the attitude of a son. Instead, he is resentful toward his brother as if he were his enemy and his father as if he committed some serious crime by welcoming his brother, who wasted his life and property. Thus, he hates the return of his brother and the grand welcome given to him by his father. 

2. For all his obedience and faithfulness, the older son could only blame and find fault with his father. Nevertheless, for all his prodigality and waywardness, the younger son develops trust in his father. This is why while the younger son could say, ‘I shall go to my father,’ the older one could only fume and complain, ‘You never gave me anything all these years.’ 

3. At the end of the story, we discover that it is the ‘sinful’ younger son who acknowledges the goodness of his father, while the ‘virtuous’ older son blames his father for having lost his mind. In this, we also find that it is the younger son who behaves more like a son, unlike the older son, who considers himself merely a servant, with no rights and privileges. 

Jesus portrays the Father as the vulnerable one, caught between a resentful son and a returning son. Though the father treats both equally, he suffers more from the behaviour of the older one, who accuses him of being magnanimous, compassionate, and loving, than from the behaviour of his younger son, who walked back to his father in love and trust when he lost everything. 

At the end of the parable, Jesus lets us conclude that there is a lot of difference between ‘I shall go to my Father’ and ‘You have not given me even a lamb all these years.’

Let us pray that we may be trustworthy to the compassion and love of God. 

Fr. Dhinakaran Savariyar