Once again, our just God utilizes a parable to instruct us how we ought to be, and how we ought not to be. In the Parable of the Wedding Feast, we learn that many who have been invited to a kingly feast reject the invitation. The king then continues to invite others who also refuse to participate. Persistent, the king invites those thought to be unworthy by their peers. An individual enters into the feast but is recognized by the King to be improperly dressed, and is not only dismissed from the feast but is bound and cast into darkness with wailing and grinding of teeth.

Our God is the King of Glory. We are continually invited to the banquet of love. Too often, we reject the invitation. God continues to invite us, and some of us continue to refuse to respond properly. Our God, though, never ceases to invite us. Some of us eventually accept the invitation, but our response is not one of humility and gratitude, but is driven by other motives. Conditions have been set for participating in God’s heavenly kingdom: We must love our God with all our heart, with all our soul, all our mind, and all our strength, and love our neighbor as ourselves. If we fail to love as God loves us, we reject the invitation to God’s feast.

Jesus Christ, our Savior, invites us to participate in every Eucharistic feast. Through his life, death, and resurrection, we have been taught how to live. May we gratefully accept his invitation and become what we receive. If we do, we are assured that we will be received into God’s glorious, everlasting Kingdom.

Prayer:

Through the intercession of Saint Peter Julian Eymard, may we attain the grace to surrender our will to God’s will and be the love that we are called to be, building the kingdom for all to enjoy.