14th / 15th October, 2017
Twenty-eighth Sunday in Ordinary Time
You are giving a party! You have fixed the date, you have drawn up your list of people you would invite, you
send out your invitations with RSVP and now wait for responses.
There are three kind of responses.
1) Some accept your invitation every acceptance makes you feel happy. Some may accept half- heartedly;
they are coming only because they feel they are obliged. Others accept with enthusiasm; they feel honoured
and grateful for having been invited.
2) Others refuse your invitation. Every refusal disappoints, perhaps even offends you, but at least you know
where you stand with those people. There are of course degrees of refusal. Some would like to come, but
have a prior engagement on that date. Others are simply not interested it’s just that they won’t come.
3) Others simply just don’t respond to your invitation – yes that too is a response – you wait and wait but no
reply comes. This is the worst kind of response of all. Worse than a refusal when a refusal comes at least you
know where you stand with them. But these you don’t. You are left wondering what’s going on. A have you
inadvertently offended the invited ones? Worse you don’t know and you probably never will know.
God doesn’t compel us. He invites us. A command can’t be so easily ignored, but an invitation can.
Advertisers can’t compel us to buy a certain product, but they resort ways to trying to persuade us.
God doesn’t act like that. God has too much respect for our freedom.
Often we know what we really want, more even what is good for us. What we are seeking, and what we know
deep down we really value and desire, are not always the same thing. Perhaps we are so busy, our lives are
so full, that even God has difficulty in breaking through to us.
Only God knows what is truly best for us. And just as parents want the best for their children, so a God
wants the best for us, who are his children.
What is God calling us to? God is calling us to a deeper and more authentic life here on earth. He is calling
us into intimacy with himself. He is calling us into community with others. And at death he will call us into
eternal life.
To ignore God’s invitation altogether is the worst form of refusal. It implies indifference. Indifferent people
are the hardest to convert.
May we all invite a metanoia – a change of heart, and warmly accept the Lords invitation to grow deeper in
his love.
Best wishes and God bless
Dean Peter.