Let's fill the banquet hall

XXVIII Sunday in Ordinary Time Matthew 22:1-14 Jesus again in reply spoke to the chief priests and elders of the people in parables, saying,"The kingdom of heaven may be likened to a king who gave a wedding feast for his son. He dispatched his servants to summon the invited guests to the feast, but they refused to come. A second time he sent other servants, saying, 'Tell those invited: "Behold, I have prepared my banquet, my calves and fattened cattle are killed, and everything is ready; come to the feast."' Some ignored the invitation and went away, one to his farm, another to his business. The rest laid hold of his servants,mistreated them, and killed them. The king was enraged and sent his troops, destroyed those murderers, and burned their city. Then he said to his servants, 'The feast is ready, but those who were invited were not worthy to come. Go out, therefore, into the main roads and invite to the feast whomever you find.' The servants went out into the streets and gathered all they found, bad and good alike, and the hall was filled with guests."

Thank goodness! Finally, a parable about a banquet. For three weeks Jesus spoke in parables saying that the kingdom of God was like going to work in a vineyard. Remember? First it was the workers hired at different times, but they all received the same wage. Then it was the two sons: One who said he was going to work, but he didn't, and the other who said he wasn't going to work, but did. And last Sunday it was one of the workers who killed the messengers and even the son thinking that they would be able to own the vineyard. For me it was too much work. I think we work a lot here in this world, I don't want to think that in the kingdom of God we are going to have to continue working. That's why I love today's gospel. The first reading also paints a picture of the kingdom I want to go to. " On this mountain the LORD of hosts will provide for all peoples a feast of rich food and choice wines, juicy, rich food and pure, choice wines." This is my picture of the kingdom of God. A perfect place. Like a quinceañera on the ranchos in Mexico. Where everyone is invited, there is plenty of food and drink. Everyone is happy dancing and partying, but with the big difference that the banquet that is the kingdom of God never ends. There is no last song from the musicians. We don't have to worry that you are going to run out of the barbecue and there is plenty of beer and wine. This is my picture of the kingdom of God. It's the place where I want to go. There are three parts or rather three groups in the gospel. The first group are the guests who don't accept the invitation. It's something we can't understand. Why is it that there are people who won't want to go to the party? They're the ones who were invited first. And not just once but twice. We can imagine that they were the richest in the village; the socialites, the better than everyone else. Remembering the parables of the last three weeks? They were the Pharisees, priests and Sadducees. They're the ones who thought they had more right than the others. The ones who thought they owned the vineyard and could say who got in. I know very well why they didn't want to go. They to this day won´t go not because they don't want to go to the party, but because of the guests. When they realize that the workers were guests, the simple people, the sinners, prostitutes and many more. They said, "Thanks! but no thanks! We don't want to go to a banquet with these kinds of people. If that's the way the kingdom of God is, leave me out." But not only do they not want to go, their reaction is violent, even killing those who had invited the sinners to the banquet. To me a good example of this today are the people who complain about the welcome that the church is offering to our LGBTQ brothers and sisters. They think its their right to exclude them, but in the end they are the ones who are excluded. And like the people in the gospel sometimes their reaction is violent. The second group is us. We are the ones who accepted the invitation to the banquet. We are not perfect, we are not rich or better than anyone. But our presence today is saying that we want to enter. We want to live the Christian life, we practice works of charity visiting the sick, helping the poor and migrants. We are the ones who put our families first and make sacrifices for our children, we help our parents when they are old and their memories begin to fade. This is us we are inside the party. Now who are the third group? 'The feast is prepared; but those who had been invited were not worthy. So go out to the crossroads and invite everyone you meet to the wedding feast.' This is the work of evangelization. We who are inside, we who have accepted the invitation have work. The work of evangelization. We have to go to the crossroads and invite everyone. This is Pope Francis' image of the kingdom of God: "The Church is called to go out of herself and to go to the peripheries, not only in the geographical sense but also to go to the existential peripheries: those of the mysteries of sin, of pain, of injustice, of ignorance and religious indifference, of thought, of all misery. Mercy is the first thing that the Catholic Church is called to bring to those peripheries." So it's wonderful that we´ve accepted the invitation, that we are inside the banquet, we're here at the party. But our work isn't done. We have to go out, we have to go out to the peripheries and invite everyone until the halln is full. Until everyone has been invited.