It is interesting to hear this week about the priority concern of a Jew in the First Century AD who asks: "Lord, will only a few be saved?" (Lk 13: 28) What is the question that someone would ask the Lord in 2022? If you go to funerals and listen to the eulogies there seems to be an automatic assumption that the deceased is "with the angels" or "looking down from heaven." This sentiment disregards any accountability for what the deceased has done or not done during his or her life. St Paul teaches, however: "For all of us must appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each may receive recompense for what has been done in the body, whether good or evil." (2 Cor 4: 10) Elsewhere in Scripture we have sayings such as: "For many are called, but few are chosen." (Mtt 24: 12) Some people, such as those influenced by Jansenism, take this to mean that very few will enjoy the glories of heaven. At the same time we can read: "This is right and acceptable in the sight of God our Saviour, who desires everyone to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth." (1 Tim 2: 3-4) The response of Jesus to the question today is a warning against presumption. We are not passive in the face of the challenge posed by sin and death. To be saved and live in the freedom that God wants for us, now and for eternity, we need to "Strive to enter through the narrow door." (Lk 13: 24) We need to follow our Lord and Master through the door rather than stand idly by as spectators saying: "We ate and drank with you, and you taught in our streets." (Lk 13: 26) This parable may have been a shot across the bows to the Jews of Jesus' time and of the first Christians that the Gentiles would listen where they would not but it also has relevance to us today especially if we are smug and entitled in our cultural Catholicism.
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