Robert Barron - The Heavenly Banquet
Peace be with you, friends. This fourth Sunday of Lent gives us marvelous readings. The gospel presents the magnificent parable of the prodigal son, and I will get to it, but today I want to focus on all three readings. The Church always provides us with these very rich readings during Lent, and the correspondences between the Old Testament, the Epistle of Paul, and the gospel are quite striking today.
The first reading is a little sneaky; we tend to overlook it and wonder why this peculiar passage is included. It is from the Book of Joshua. When you have a chance, get out your Bibles and read through Joshua. It is a very adventurous book. You know the story: Joshua was the successor of Moses. Upon Moses' death, Joshua takes over the leadership of Israel, leading them finally into the promised land. Moses does not have that privilege; he brought them to the brink, but it is Joshua who fights the great battle and leads them into the promised land.
We call him Joshua to distinguish him from Jesus because it is the same name, Yeshua, in Hebrew for this Old Testament figure. The Church Fathers did not overlook this connection; they saw the Old Testament Yeshua, Joshua, as very much a type of Christ, an anticipation of Christ. Now, why is that? Jesus of Nazareth is the one who fights the definitive battle against sin and death and leads his people through his dying and rising into the definitive Promised Land of Heaven. Thus, the Old Testament Joshua, who fights a physical military battle and leads the people into a physical space, is a type — an anticipation of Jesus.
With that in mind, listen to what we hear: while the Israelites were encamped at Gilgal on the plains of Jericho, just about to enter the promised land, they celebrated the Passover in the evening of the 14th of the month. On the day after Passover, they entered the promised land and ate the produce of the land. Then it tells us that the manna ceased from that moment on.
Remember the story of the manna? The Israelites were journeying for 40 years through the desert, where there were no crops and nothing they could eat. They begged the Lord, and the Lord sent this strange substance. «Manna» in Hebrew means «What is that?» That’s why they called it manna — this thin, wafer-like food that sustained them. Although there was nothing savory about the manna, it was just enough to keep them going. It lasted until they reached the edge of the promised land, and once they entered, the manna stopped, and they began to eat the fruit of the earth in the promised land.
Oh, okay, you’re a Church Father. You know there’s a typological relationship between the Old Testament Yeshua and the New Testament Yeshua. Jesus leads the people into the promised land of heaven, and see what happens: the manna, which had been sustaining us for a long time, will give way to the true food of heaven. What are we talking about? The Eucharist! Notice, please, the Passover reference: Joshua, in the Old Testament, celebrates Passover and then, the next day, enters the promised land. What does New Testament Yeshua do? Well, he has a Passover meal with his disciples. He takes the Passover bread and says, «This is my body.» He takes the Passover cup, saying, «This is the chalice of my blood.» He gives them the gift of the Eucharist, and then he, through his dying and rising, passes over into the realm of heaven to which he is now leading us. What do we have? Everybody on the long trek through the desert on the way to heaven has a thin wafer-like meal that sustains us.
Now, watch: is the Eucharist that we consume savory food? Is it like the food we eat at a great banquet? No, no! There’s something utterly humble and simple about it—the real presence of Jesus, yes indeed, but appearing humbly under these sacramental signs of bread and wine. It is food for the journey. What keeps us going on the way through the desert of this world to the promised land of heaven? What will happen when we pass from this world into the promised sign of heaven? What will give way? Everybody, it is the Eucharist, because now we will see him face to face. Now we will feast on the full reality of his body and blood, not under humble sacramental signs, but in themselves and on their own terms.
Now, please don’t think for a second that I’m denigrating the Eucharist— not at all! The Eucharist is the real, true, and substantial presence of Jesus, but in this humble form, like the manna in the desert, it will cease. Thomas insists— it will cease, because in heaven we will see him as he is, and we will eat, as it were, of the produce of the promised land.
All right, that’s a Eucharistic reading of this text from Joshua. Can I suggest to you that as it anticipates the heavenly banquet, it’s very connected to our second reading from the second letter of St. Paul to the Corinthians? After you finish Joshua, go to the New Testament, to these marvelous letters of Paul. But the two he wrote to the Corinthians are especially rich. Read through that second letter to the Corinthians, but listen now to what he says in this passage, because I think it’s one of the really decisive passages in the entire New Testament. He says, «Whoever is in Christ is a new creation. The old things have passed away. Behold, new things have come.» What makes Christianity distinctive when you see it in relation to the other religions?
Well, look at all the other religions; they have to do with some moral or intellectual transformation. A good Buddhist, the Buddha himself, would say, «There’s this eight-fold path that I’ve discovered that has helped me to live my spiritual life in a richer way. I’d like you to follow it,» so change your behavior and your mind to fit the eight-fold path. A good Muslim would say, «This revelation was given to Muhammad, and it’s teaching us to submit to the will of Allah. That’s what I want you to do: change your mind and your behavior to submit to Allah.» As a Confucian, the same applies; there’s a moral teaching from Confucius, and I want you to adapt to it. A Jew would say, «I want you to follow the teachings of the Torah.» Okay, all good and fine as far as they go.
Then there’s Christianity, which is qualitatively different. It’s qualitatively different; why? Because Christianity is not just about changing your ideas or your moral behavior. It is about becoming a new creation. Christ didn’t come just to make us nicer people; He didn’t come so we might be more morally upright. Aristotle can teach us how to be morally upright. Jesus came to divinize us, to make us divine, to make us sharers in His own nature. I mean, nothing is as trivial, if you want, as moral reform. Moral reform is fine, but that’s not what Christianity is about.
Again, whoever is in Christ is a new creation. Here’s a line I’ve often cited when people ask me what Christianity is all аbout: I cite this line from Second Corinthians, «God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself.» I suggest that, in a way, all of our doctrine is contained in that line, all of our creed: everything. God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not just making it morally better; He was drawing it into His own life, divinizing it. That’s why the Church Fathers said over and over again, all of them, East and West: «Deus fit Homo, et Homo fit Deus.» God became man so that man might become God. Now, say what you want about that; I mean, quarrel with it, disagree with it, but it’s not like the other religions. That’s not what the other religions say. It’s something strange, wonderful, and qualitatively different.
Okay, what’s the link between the reading from Joshua and this reading from Second Corinthians? What is the Eucharist, everybody? What is the Eucharist? Oh, I—it’s a nice symbol that makes me think about Jesus, so I become a morally better person. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no! I mean, please God, you become a morally better person—that’s all fine—but the Eucharist is the body and blood of Jesus. I’m talking about the body and blood of Jesus, and we eat his body and drink his blood under these sacramental signs, listen, that we might become conformed to him. Moral implications from that? Sure, of course! But what matters is metaphysics, not morals, if I can put it that way. What matters most is ontology, not a change of behavior. I become a different person; I’m changed by eating the body and drinking the blood of Jesus.
Okay, what I wanted to do, everyone, was take you through those two readings just to shed some fresh light on the very familiar story of the Prodigal Son. We know the contours of it very well: this younger son who’s frankly a bit of a jerk, right? He says, «Hey Father, give me my share of the inheritance coming to me right now.» Well, I mean, you couldn’t insult your father more thoroughly than that! I’m not even going to wait until you die to get my inheritance. So the father gives it to him, and of course he squanders it on riotous living. He’s a bad guy all the way, and then he hits rock bottom. He’s feeding the pigs. For a Jew, I mean, pigs were unclean, and you’re feeding the pigs? You can’t get any lower; that’s the point.
Alright, alright. I know I’m a terrible sinner, so I’m going to go back to my father. I’m going to crawl back, hoping against hope that he’ll take me back, and he gives his speech: «Father, I’ve sinned against God and against you.» And the father, right away, just cuts him off, embraces him, gives him the ring on his finger, kills the fatted calf, puts his own cloak on him, and brings him into a banquet. Who is this figure, this father? It’s God, listen! He wants to divinize us; he wants to share his life with us. We’re all like the Prodigal Son, you know, to varying degrees, but we’re all like him. We’re all making demands of God all the time; we want what we want when we want it. We squander what he gives us; we make a wreck of our lives. We all do; we’ve all sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, right? Nevertheless, if we but signal an openness to forgiveness, he brings us in, clothed in his own nature. You see what the cloak means? Look at Rembrandt’s famous painting of the Prodigal Son, and the son is in the same cloak as the father—the rings, the father’s ring, clothed in his nature. He brings him into the great banquet.
Now, Joshua, right? The manna ends, and they enter the Promised Land. They eat the fruit of the Promised Land. Second Corinthians: I’m not just here to make you morally better; I’m here to divinize you, and it happens through the Eucharist, everybody. That’s the great banquet! That’s the great banquet to which God, in his gracious love, invites even us, the worst of sinners. God bless you!