(Vatican Radio) At the heart of Christianity is an invitation to the Lord’s feast.
That was Pope Francis’ message at Mass this morning at the Casa Santa Marta. The Pope
said that the Church is “not only for good people;” the invitation to be a part of
it concerns everyone. And he added that, at the Lord’s feast we must “participate
fully” and with everyone; we can’t pick and choose. Christians, he said, can’t be
content with simply being on the guest list – not participating fully is like not
joining in.
The readings of the day, the Pope said, the identity of the Christian.
He emphasized that “first of all, the Christian essence is an invitation: we only
become Christians if we are invited.” It is a “free invitation” from God to participate.
You can’t pay to get into the feast, he warned: “either you are invited or you can’t
come in.” If “in our conscience,” he said, “we don’t have this certainty of being
invited” then “we haven’t understood what a Christian is”:
“A Christian
is one who is invited. Invited to what? To a shop? To take a walk? The Lord wants
to tell us something more: You are invited to join in the feast, to the joy of being
saved, to the joy of being redeemed, to the joy of sharing life with Christ. This
is a joy! You are called to a party! A feast is a gathering of people who talk, laugh,
celebrate, are happy together. I have never seen anyone party on their own. That would
be boring, no? Opening the bottle of wine . . . That’s not a feast, it’s something
else. You have to party with others, with the family, with friends, with those who’ve
been invited, as I was invited. Being Christian means belonging, belonging to this
body, to the people that have been invited to the feast: this is Christian belonging.”
Turning
to the Letter to the Romans, the Pope then affirmed that this feast is a “feast of
unity.” He underlined the fact that all are invited, “the good and the bad.” And the
first to be invited are the marginalized:
“The Church is not the Church
only for good people. Do we want to describe who belongs to the Church, to this feast?
The sinners. All of us sinners are invited. At this point there is a community that
has diverse gifts: one has the gift of prophecy, another of ministry, who teaching.
. . We all have qualities and strengths. But each of us brings to the feast a common
gift. Each of us is called to participate fully in the feast. Christian existence
cannot be understood without this participation. ‘I go to the feast, but I don’t go
beyond the antechamber, because I want to be only with the three or four people that
I familiar with. . .’ You can’t do this in the Church! You either participate fully
or you remain outside. You can’t pick and choose: the Church is for everyone, beginning
with those I’ve already mentioned, the most marginalized. It is everyone’s Church!”
Speaking
about the parable in which Jesus said some who were invited began to make excuses,
Pope Francis said: “They don’t accept the invitation! They say ‘yes,’ but their actions
say ‘no.’” These people, he said, “are Christians who are content to be on the guest
list: chosen Christians.” But, he warned, this is not sufficient, because if you don’t
participate you are not a Christian. “You were on the list,” he said, but this isn’t
enough for salvation! This is the Church: to enter into the Church is a grace; to
enter into the Church is an invitation.” And this right, he added, cannot be purchased.
“To enter into the Church,” he added, “is to become part of a community, the community
of the Church. To enter into the Church is to participate in all the virtues, the
qualities that the Lord has given us in our service of one for the other.” Pope Francis
continued, “To enter into the Church means to be responsible for those things that
the Lord asks of us.” Ultimately, he said, “to enter into the Church is to enter into
this People of God, in its journey towards eternity.” No one, he warned, is the protagonist
of the Church: but we have ONE,” who has done everything. God “is the protagonist!”
We are his followers . . . and “he who does not follow Him is the one who excuses
himself” and does not go to the feast:
The Lord is very generous. The Lord
opens all doors. The Lord also understands those who say to Him, ‘No, Lord, I don’t
want to go to you.’ He understands and is waiting for them, because He is merciful.
But the Lord does not like those who say ‘yes’ and do the opposite; who pretend to
thank Him for all the good things; who have good manners, but go their own way and
do not follow the way of the Lord: those who always excuse themselves, those who do
not know joy, who don’t experience the joy of belonging. Let us ask the Lord for this
grace of understanding: how beautiful it is to be invited to the feast, how beautiful
it is to take part in it and to share one’s qualities, how beautiful it is to be with
Him and how wrong it is to dither between ‘yes’ and ‘no,’ to say ‘yes,’ but to be
satisfied merely with being a nominal Christian.