“While He was still a long way off…”

The mentor of C.S Lewis, a chap called George McDonald wrote that “it is better not to have known the Father, than to have learned Him wrong”.

For those of my generation the way God the Father was presented was a bit worrying, especially if you were taught by nuns and you were boys, aka ‘the barbarian horde’. The chances of heaven were so slim, I don’t recall it ever being mentioned or described; whereas purgatory and hell were described in such detail we wondered how the sisters had got out so as to return and tell us about it. The idea of God as a loving Father was not on the radar.

Often religion clashes with reality as we read in the parable of the prodigal son, where Jesus tells us who His father really is.

After coming to his senses and heading home with a desire to be reunited with his father, we see a father who is already scanning the horizon, hoping and waiting for his return. This is how it is with Our Father too, He waits, His eyes moving across the earth in search of His lost sons and daughters. Perhaps even engineering their return, sending them messengers, interventions, nudges to guide their steps home.

And when they do have that moment of clarity, or change of heart, He runs to them. He doesn’t wait. He runs to them ‘clasped him in his arms and kissed him’ as the scripture puts it.

He doesn’t need to hear the carefully crafted speech or apology. Nope. He is already celebrating ‘Quick! Bring out the best robe and put it on him; put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet. Bring the calf we have been fattening, and kill it; we will celebrate by having a feast, because this son of mine was dead and has come back to life; he was lost and is found.’

That’s who the Father is. Nothing to fear for those who want to come home. No obstacles in our path if a change of heart and reunion with God is what we desire. That is the great gift of Divine Mercy. He wants us back more than we want it. And there is joy, not anger awaiting us.

Sr Euphraxia

Chapter XXVI (from stories of the desert fathers/ sisters)

One day the gatekeeper came to the abbess with an urgent message.

"My lady," she said, "there is a woman standing weeping outside the gate with her child of about eight years old, paralysed, deaf and dumb."

The abbess knew by the revelation of the Spirit that Euphraxia had been given the grace of the Lord against demons.

"Ask Euphraxia to come here," she said to the gatekeeper. And when she appeared she said to her:

"Go and take that child from his mother and bring him here."

She went out to the gate and when she saw the child, paralysed and trembling, she was over come with compassion, heaved a deep sigh and made the sign of the cross over him.

"May he who created you heal you, my son," she said.

And she picked him up and took him to the abbess. While she was carrying him the boy was healed and began to cry for his mother, which gave Euphraxia such a start that she dropped the boy on the floor. The boy immediately got up and ran towards the gate, still crying for his mother. Meanwhile the gatekeeper ran to the abbess to tell her what had happened. The abbess called the mother of the child.

"Now look here, my sister," she said, "Have you come here simply to pay tricks on us?

"In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, my lady," said the mother, "that child has never walked or spoken a word until this present moment. But when that other sister picked him up he began to speak! She was so startled she dropped him on the floor, but the child got up immediately and ran to me, your servant."

"So then, he is completely restored to you!" she said. "Take him and go in peace."

Which she did, and departed glorifying God.