Mass Reading & Meditation for August 23, 2012

Meditation: Matthew 22:1-14

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“Everything is ready; come to the feast.” (Matthew 22:4)

A master storyteller, Jesus liked to use parables to teach about his king­dom. In today’s Gospel, he compared the kingdom to a feast held by a king for his son’s wedding. As the parable unfolds, the invited guests refuse the invitation. Some even kill the king’s messengers—an image of Israel’s rejection of the prophets, which the chief priests and elders would have understood. So the king orders his servants to gather all the people they could find, “bad and good alike,” to fill the hall. The kingdom of God is offered to everyone—Gentile and Jew, sinner and saint. The invitation is universal.

So why is one of the guests who was invited off the street thrown out for not wearing a wedding garment? Isn’t this unfair of the king? After all, he opened the feast to everyone, and on short notice as well! Evidently, the parable either presumes that the man had time to go fetch his party clothes or—as some scholars suggest—it assumes that it was customary for the host to provide festive apparel for his guests. In either case, the man’s inability to offer any excuse for his inappropriate dress reflects a sense of negligence or carelessness.

The point of this parable? Simply accepting God’s invitation doesn’t guarantee us a place at his banquet. If we want to enter the kingdom, we have to be wearing the garments of repentance and a changed life. Following Jesus requires “putting on” the attitudes, values, and behav­iors of the kingdom—faith, charity, good deeds. As St. Paul told the Colossians, we need to “take off the old self with its practices and put on the new self, which is being renewed … in the image of its creator” (Colossians 3:9-10).

The guest in unsuitable clothing hadn’t put off his sinful ways and wasn’t bearing—or wearing—the fruit of repentance. It’s true that God may patiently tolerate the presence of “good and bad alike” for a time. But on judgment day, those who lack the wedding garment of con­version will not be welcomed at his feast. So be sure to put on your own wedding garment—and keep it on!

“Heavenly Father, help me to put on Jesus Christ and conform my life to the gospel. I look forward to the eternal banquet that you have prepared for me.”

Ezekiel 36:23-28 Psalm 51:12-15, 18-19