ePriest.com: Your Spanish Homily

Readings

Reading I: Isaiah 25:6-10
Psalm: Psalms 23:1-3, 3-4, 5, 6
Reading II: Philippians 4:12-14, 19-20
Gospel: Matthew 22:1-14 or 22:1-10

Preaching Tip

Preacher as Bridge

Through offering the holy sacrifice, priests have always been bridges between God and man. But the preaching of God's Word also has a bridge-like function:

  • "The preacher represents this community by voicing its concerns, by naming its demons, and thus enabling it to gain some understanding and control of the evil which afflicts it.
  • "He represents the Lord by offering the community another word, a word of healing and pardon, of acceptance and love.
  • "Like humans everywhere, the people who make up the liturgical assembly are people hungry, sometimes desperately so, for meaning in their lives. For a time they may find meaning in their jobs, their families and friends, their political or social causes.
  • "All these concerns, good and valid as they are, fall short of providing ultimate meaning. Without ultimate meaning, we are ultimately unsatisfied.
  • "If we are able to hear a word which gives our lives another level of meaning, which interprets them in relation to God, then our response is to turn to this source of meaning in an attitude of praise and thanksgiving."

Fulfilled in Your Hearing: The Homily in the Sunday Assembly, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops

A to 28                                              

INVITADOS AL BANQUETE

El mensaje principal de la parábola del banquete es este: Todos hemos sido invitados al cielo, pero nuestra entrada en él va a depender de nuestra respuesta personal. ¡Llegar al cielo! Es el negocio más importante que hemos de realizar en esta vida porque, ¿de qué nos sirve lograr un buen nivel de bienestar, éxito en la carrera y en el trabajo, si al final perdemos nuestra alma?  La verdadera sabiduría, como decía santa Teresa se resume en este dicho popular:  "Al final ,el que se salva sabe y el que no, no sabe nada".

Hermanas y hermanos:

1.  El banquete de bodas es la figura de un Dios que llama a todos los hombres a compartir con él la fiesta perfecta, pero que no encuentra la respuesta deseada. El banquete preparado, no gusta a muchos. Algunos responden a la invitación con indiferencia porque no cuadra con sus intereses; otros la rechazan abiertamente; e incluso hay también quien traza un plan formal para boicotear el programa, destruyendo sistemáticamente todos los valores morales de la convivencia humana y dicen: "Hay que eliminar todas las expresiones religiosas, destruir sus símbolos, acallar sus voces".

2.  Sin embargo el comportamiento de Dios es respetuoso de la libertad humana. Los invitados del Rey dejan de ir al banquete por motivos materiales como el trabajo o los negocios; de manera semejante los hombres de hoy en gran parte se alejan de la fe por motivos de hedonismo o por las ideologías de turno. El mundo moderno está sufriendo de una enfermedad espiritual.

El ateísmo intenta "matar a Dios" o al menos hacerlo desaparecer de nuestra sociedad. El mismo Nietszche que se declaraba ateo exclamaba: "¿Cómo hemos hecho esto? ¿Acaso no nos estamos precipitando en el abismo, delante, atrás, a los lados, por todas partes? ¿Queda todavía un arriba y un abajo? ¿Acaso no andamos errando a través de un nada infinito?"

3.  Dios sigue teniendo esperanzas en el hombre. Él ha enviado su invitación a todos, "a los buenos y a los malos" sin excepción. Lo que nos permite la participación en el banquete del Reino de los cielos es la conversión a la gracia y a la caridad. Si esta falta "seremos arrojados a las tinieblas exteriores" como ocurrió al que no vestía la "túnica nupcial".

¿Qué significa el vestido nupcial? Significa la caridad. Tenía razón San Gregorio Magno cuando predicaba que algunos están en la Iglesia con la fe pero sin la caridad. Nosotros somos comensales en el banquete del Verbo -decía él- porque tenemos la fe de la Iglesia y nos nutrimos con el alimento de las Sagradas Escrituras. Pero, mirad si venís con el vestido nupcial; examinad vuestros pensamientos, sopesad vuestros corazones para ver si no albergáis odio contra alguno, si la envidia no os quema por dentro a causa de la felicidad ajena, si no rumiáis planes ocultos para dañar a vuestro prójimo con malicia".

Dice un refrán popular que "si no te pareces a quien amas, es porque no amas a quienes te pareces". Y es que el amor o encuentra semejantes a los que aman o los hace semejantes. El verdadero amor lleva a darse, pero a darse de verdad, sin recortes, sin falsificaciones, sin limitaciones, sin hipocresías. Pidamos a Dios que así sea.

English Translation

28th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year A                                                                                               

  INVITED TO THE BANQUET

The principle message of the parable is this: We have all been invited to heaven, but whether we get in or not depends on each individual person. To achieve heaven! Arriving there is the most important job of our life. What’s the good of a comfortable lifestyle, a successful career if we lose our soul?  As St. Teresa of Avila says about true wisdom, “In the end, the one who gets it is the one who is saved; and the one who isn’t saved doesn’t understand anything at all.”   


Brothers and Sisters:

1. The parable of this wedding banquet gives us the image of a God who calls all people to share a great feast with him, but does not receive the response he was looking for. The banquet is ready, yet few are interested in coming. Some respond indifferently to the invitation because it does not suit their tastes, others openly reject it, and there are still others who devise a plan to boycott and systematically destroy every single moral value to be found in human society, saying that “all expressions of religion should be eliminated, its symbols destroyed, and its voices silenced.”

2. Nevertheless, God’s way of acting always respects human freedom. The King’s guests refuse to come to the banquet because they’re centered on material goods, such as their work or business. In a similar way, many people turn away from the faith on account of hedonism or ideologies which envelope them. The modern world is suffering from a spiritual illness.

If atheism could have its way it would “kill God,” or at least make him disappear from society altogether. Nietzsche, who considered himself an atheist, exclaimed: “What have we done? Haven’t we thrown ourselves headlong into the abyss in every sense of the word? An abyss that is before us, beside us and all around us? Does an above and below still exist? Aren’t we wandering aimlessly through an infinite nothingness?”

3. God continues to hope in us. He has sent his invitations to everyone, to “the good and the bad” alike. Conversion through grace and charity is the key to sharing in the banquet of the Kingdom of God.  If this is lacking, we will “be thrown into the darkness outside,” like the man who wasn’t wearing a “wedding garment.”

What does the “wedding garment” stand for? Charity. St. Gregory the Great was right in preaching that there were some in the Church who have faith, yet still lack charity. We are all guests at the banquet of the Word, he says, because we have the faith of the Church and nourish ourselves on Sacred Scriptures. Ask yourselves if you come dressed in the wedding garment; take a look at your thoughts and examine your hearts to see if you harbor grudges against anyone, if envy burns inside of you because of someone else’s happiness , or if you maliciously brood over secret desires to harm your neighbor.

There’s a Spanish saying that goes like this: “If you don’t resemble the person you love, it’s because you don’t love those whom you resemble.” When it comes to love, people in love are already similar to each other or they become similar. True love brings us to give of ourselves without holding anything back, without deceptions, without limits, and without hypocrisy. Let us ask  God to be this way.