“There will be rejoicing among the angels of God over one sinner who repents.” – Luke 15:10

Let’s talk reality. If you had 10 one-peso coins and misplaced one, would you look for it? If you had a hundred chickens and lost one, would you spend time finding it? Most people whom I’d asked this question answered no. We’d rather spend our time earning 10 times what we’d lost.

Thankfully, that’s not who our Father in heaven is! This discourse in Luke 15 has three parables, all of them talking about rejoicing after finding one who is lost. It speaks so much about the heart of our Father. It shows us that His priority is finding those among us who are lost.

We cannot stay inside the church and hope that the lost will come to us. Pope Francis says, “Instead of being just a church that welcomes and receives by keeping the doors open, let us try also to be a church that finds new roads, that is able to step outside itself and go to those who do not attend Mass, to those who have quit or are indifferent.”

Let’s get out of the church and seek the lost in God’s Kingdom.

Boggs Burbos (boggsburbos@yahoo.com)

reflect

Write down two names of people who seem lost. Pray for them every day. If possible, speak to them daily.

Father, disturb me that I may go out of the church and seek the lost. Grant me the courage to talk to people. Help me bring them home into Your loving presence.

St. Joseph Khang, pray for us.

Paul reminds us that we will one day stand before the judgment seat of Christ and receive from Him the reward for our works. The souls in purgatory are in a state of purification from the stains of sin and the temporal punishments for the sins they had not done penance. Through our prayers, we can assist them to come to perfection and enter into the glory of heaven.

⁷ Brothers and sisters: None of us lives for oneself, and no one dies for oneself. ⁸ For if we live, we live for the Lord, and if we die, we die for the Lord; so then, whether we live or die, we are the Lord’s. ⁹ For this is why Christ died and came to life, that he might be Lord of both the dead and the living. ¹⁰ Why then do you judge your brother or sisters? Or you, why do you look down on your brother or sisters? For we shall all stand before the judgment seat of God; ¹¹ for it is written: As I live, says the Lord, every knee shall bend before me, and every tongue shall give praise to God. ¹² So then each of us shall give an account of himself to God.

Responsorial Psalm | Psalm 27:1, 4, 13-14

R: I believe that I shall see the good things of the Lord in the land of the living.

¹ The Lord is my light and my salvation; whom should I fear? The Lord is my life’s refuge; of whom should I be afraid? (R) ⁴ One thing I ask of the Lord; this I seek: To dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, that I may gaze on the loveliness of the Lord and contemplate his temple. (R) ¹³ I believe that I shall see the bounty of the Lord in the land of the living. ¹⁴ Wait for the Lord with courage; be stouthearted, and wait for the Lord. (R)  

Gospel | Luke 15:1-10

God does not want to lose even one of us to the devil. He will keep searching for us, no matter how far we stray or how lost we are. But we do not have to return to Him if we do not want to. He loves us so much that He gives us the freedom to reject Him. This reveals the frightening power of love and its inherent hope and trust. Let us pray that we choose well.

Gospel Acclamation 

Come to me, all you who labor and are burdened, and I will give you rest, says the Lord.

¹ The tax collectors and sinners were all drawing near to listen to Jesus, ² but the Pharisees and scribes began to complain, saying, “This man welcomes sinners and eats with them.” ³ So Jesus addressed this parable to them. ⁴ “What man among you having a hundred sheep and losing one of them would not leave the ninety-nine in the desert and go after the lost one until he finds it? ⁵ And when he does find it, he sets it on his shoulders with great joy ⁶ and, upon his arrival home, he calls together his friends and neighbors and says to them, ‘Rejoice with me because I have found my lost sheep.’ ⁷ I tell you, in just the same way there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous people who have no need of repentance. ⁸ “Or what woman having ten coins and losing one would not light a lamp and sweep the house, searching carefully until she finds it? ⁹ And when she does find it, she calls together her friends and neighbors and says to them, ‘Rejoice with me because I have found the coin that I lost.’ ¹⁰ In just the same way, I tell you, there will be rejoicing among the angels of God over one sinner who repents.”

Reflect:

Was there a time in your life when you thought of rejecting God’s love? Why?

Read the Bible in one year! Read PSALMS 11 - 15 today.

When I was a newly ordained priest, I helped out at a parish which had problems with its staff. Many members of the pastoral team were poorly motivated, and some were known to lie about things they had done or not done. Worst of all, one or two of them were known to have stolen from the guest rooms or donation boxes of the parish. When I first came, I thought it would just be a matter of time before my boss, the parish priest, would let these people go. But when I spoke to him about these problems, his response confounded me. He said, “But not one among all those given us should be lost.”

“How silly,” I thought. Only many years later did I understand how that priest was mirroring Jesus’ kind of love, however foolish it seemed then. I was assessing the problem in corporate, worldly terms, where people should be given what is due to them. He was thinking in pastoral terms as a good shepherd would, caring for his entire team—the good and the bad, the truthful and the liar, the honest and the thief alike—not wanting the worst of them to be lost.

I recently visited that parish and saw how vibrant that team had become because their boss listened to their needs, cared for them deeply, and helped them to change. If a good priest like him could exude such transformative patience and mercy, what more our Father in heaven?

Today’s readings remind us that: we are the Lord’s. And there is nothing He would not do to ensure that we remain counted among those who belong to Him until the very end. We pray today to trust and surrender to God’s abiding love that rejoices when the lost among us are found. 

Fr. Mark Lopez, SJ

Reflection questions

How do you treat those who have wronged you? Do you remove them from your life, or do you keep them and help them to change?

Lord, may I be a good shepherd to the people You allow me to encounter in my life. Amen.

Today, I pray for: __________________________________