Then Jesus said, ‘There was a man who had two sons.  The younger of them said to his father, “Father, give me the share of the property that will belong to me.” So he divided his property between them.  A few days later the younger son gathered all he had and traveled to a distant country, and there he squandered his property in dissolute living.  When he had spent everything, a severe famine took place throughout that country, and he began to be in need.  So he went and hired himself out to one of the citizens of that country, who sent him to his fields to feed the pigs.  He would gladly have filled himself with the pods that the pigs were eating; and no one gave him anything.  But when he came to himself he said, “How many of my father’s hired hands have bread enough and to spare, but here I am dying of hunger!  I will get up and go to my father, and I will say to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you;  I am no longer worthy to be called your son; treat me like one of your hired hands.’”  So he set off and went to his father. But while he was still far off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion; he ran and put his arms around him and kissed him.  Then the son said to him, “Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you; I am no longer worthy to be called your son.”  But the father said to his slaves, “Quickly, bring out a robe—the best one—and put it on him; put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet.   And get the fatted calf and kill it, and let us eat and celebrate; for this son of mine was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found!” And they began to celebrate.  ‘Now his elder son was in the field; and when he came and approached the house, he heard music and dancing.  He called one of the slaves and asked what was going on.  He replied, “Your brother has come, and your father has killed the fatted calf, because he has got him back safe and sound.”  Then he became angry and refused to go in.  His father came out and began to plead with him.  But he answered his father, “Listen!  For all these years I have been working like a slave for you, and I have never disobeyed your command; yet you have never given me even a young goat so that I might celebrate with my friends.  But when this son of yours came back, who has devoured your property with prostitutes, you killed the fatted calf for him!”  Then the father said to him, “Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours.   But we had to celebrate and rejoice, because this brother of yours was dead and has come to life; he was lost and has been found.”’

Some families fuss and fight so much that it looks like there’s no way that they can reconcile. Some families wage cold war on each other, using tactics of distance, avoidance, and silence. It looks like there’s no way that they can reconcile, either. Cold war is what the father and his two sons – I call them the Prodigal Family – were fighting, and they most likely had been engaged in cold war for years leading up to the little piece of their story that Jesus told about the homecoming of the younger son.

I imagine that the younger son (I’ll call him "Baby") was the under-achiever in the family. I’ll bet you he was handsome, had lots of friends, and made poor grades in school. He was probably one of those charismatic, persuasive people with grandiose plans about what he would be someday, but, for now, he preferred to party all night and sleep all day. His older brother, Firstborn, was entirely different. The older brother, as I see him, was always the responsible child in the family who was always correct, who worked hard at everything he did, and made top grades in school. He was probably not very exciting or creative, just cautious and steady. The father did the best he could, I think, but he failed each of his sons in a different way. Father Prodigal openly adored Baby and acted like he could do no wrong. Father P. also bailed Baby out of trouble from time to time and some of the bail-outs were costly. He spoiled Baby. On the other hand, although Father Prodigal admired Firstborn’s accomplishments and achievements, he often forgot to let Firstborn know how proud he was that Firstborn could take care of himself. Father Prodigal loved Firstborn, too, but just neglected to tell him, most days.

When Baby started asking Father Prodigal to split up his estate and give it to the two sons while they were still young enough to enjoy it, Firstborn argued that it would be unwise of Father to give up control of his hard-earned assets. But Baby hounded his father about this matter until, finally, Father gave in. Predictably, within days after Father split up his property between the two brothers, Baby packed up his gear and took off for parts unknown. "See you soon, Dad," I can hear him saying. "Yeah, son. Keep in touch." "Will do." Of course, he didn’t keep in touch. It was just as if he had been lost, or had died. Predictably, Firstborn stayed on, working hard every day, giving his broken-hearted father what little emotional support he was able to give to this man who had never seemed to love him.

During the time that he was away in a foreign country, things went downhill for Baby. He spent his inheritance living life as he pleased, and, about the time his last sou was gone, the economy took a nosedive, and there were no jobs available. Baby hung on to his pride until his empty stomach persuaded him that working for food was a worthwhile endeavor, and then took the only work he could get – slopping hogs for a local farmer, very humiliating, very demeaning work. Also very smelly, filthy work. His older brother, meanwhile, continued to work in the family business (also farming), and things went better for him – he was doing so well, in fact, that he was fattening up a calf to give as a sacrifice of thanksgiving for his increased prosperity. Father Prodigal spent most of his days crying and grieving for his lost son, Baby, and still took no notice of how hard Firstborn worked for his approval and his love. Firstborn, after all, was capable of taking care of himself.

You know what happened next. Baby Prodigal was starving – even the pigs ate better than he did. He decided to go back home, to beg his father’s forgiveness and ask for work as a servant or hired hand, knowing he would be fed and have a place to sleep. He even made up a speech about how wrong he had been to leave. When he got near home, Father Prodigal saw him coming and ran out to meet him, closing the distance between them. Father planned an impromptu feast that included sacrificing Firstborn’s calf as thanksgiving for Baby’s return. Firstborn arrived home after a hard, sweaty day of laboring in the fields, learned that Baby was back, and that Baby’s homecoming was being celebrated with feasting, music, and dancing. He found out that his fattened calf was to be the main course. That was the last straw. Even though his father begged him to come inside and join the celebration, Firstborn refused, and out spewed all of the resentments, angers, and jealousies that he had been stuffing down for years. Even as Firstborn was accusing his father of causing the years of distance between them, Father was reminding him, "Everything I have is yours."

I took a course in pastoral care last semester, and one of the projects that we did was to make a genogram. This is a family tree, going back two or three generations, on which you record anything you know about members of your family. Genograms are often used by priests and psychologists in counseling. I noticed several recurring issues in my genogram. Relating to health, I found that I have a strong history of cancer on one side of my family. About family relationships, I discovered that for several generations, on both sides of my family, siblings have not gotten along with each other. Brothers don’t speak to brothers; sisters dislike sisters; brothers and sisters really can’t stand each other. In my family, it is a virtue to hold a grudge. There’s a seat right beside God up there in heaven, and stars in the crown, for the family member who holds a grudge the longest. In my family, people don’t discuss their differences. They just turn their backs on whoever offends them, or, if they are really angry, just kick the other out of the family tree. (I’ve heard tell that this kind of behavior goes on in church families, too, like when someone disagrees with something that the preacher said, they just walk away and never write another check to the church.)

The Bible is full of stories about brothers who can’t get along – Cain and Abel, Joseph’s brothers selling him into slavery – and parents and children who are at odds – David and Absalom. All of which brings up the question, "How do we reconcile?" Wanting to know exactly what is meant by reconciliation, I looked up the Greek word that was used for "reconciliation" in the scripture lessons for today. I found that the one word that was used referred to returning to an intimate, committed relationship with another. In one case, the relationship referred to was the return of a wife to intimacy with her husband. In all other cases, the relationship to be reconciled was our relationship with God, or God’s with us.

When we too quickly identify the father in the story with God, however, we do ourselves a disservice, for we imagine that the father’s love is perfect, like God’s love. In the Prodigal story, the father fails at love, too. He is weak and passive as to the younger son, and fails to communicate his love to the older son. Until the end of the story, neither son knows that he is valued by the father. The emphasis of this story is on the distance, not the intimacy, in their relationships.

The grace of the story does not appear in the perfect love of the father, but in his failures. There is grace in the father’s willingness to go the whole way for each of his sons, in his choice to try again with each of his sons. Even having failed at love, he is not content to let past choices determine the future. In both instances, the father’s renewed overtures to his sons are extravagant, lavish, abundant, all-out, 100% efforts. "Bring the best robe, and sandals for his feet," and "All that I have is yours."

Will the story have a happy ending? We cannot know. What we do know is that the love of the father has intervened in the cycles of selfishness and alienation that plagued the family. Like that, we know that God rejoices when the lost among us are found, and that God actively seeks to be in relationship – intimate relationship – reconciled with us, the human family. God seeks us out, and it is for us to respond to the invitation, to join the celebration, to share the feast.

It’s important to notice that the Episcopal prayer book’s liturgy for Reconciliation of a Penitent takes the story of the Prodigal family into account. After confession, repentance, and absolution, the priest concludes with a message adapted from Jesus’s story: "Now there is rejoicing in heaven; for you were lost, and are found; you were dead, and are now alive in Christ Jesus our Lord. Abide in peace. The Lord has put away all your sins."

Anne Meroney, Seminarian  St. John’s Episcopal Church, College Park, Georgia

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