One of my favorite passages in the Scriptures was the first reading last Sunday. The passage shows Moses going up the mountain, taking off his shoes, and hearing the voice of the Lord speaking through the burning bush. The reason this is one of my favorite passages has nothing really to do with the mountain, or the burning bush, or even the voice of the Lord. I spent some time with the passage when I was on retreat before my ordination to the diaconate, which was sixteen years ago today. I read this passage over and over.
There was something about this story of Moses on the mountain with the burning bush and the voice of the Lord that just kept me there. I wasn’t ready to go meet pharaoh, and watch the plagues in Egypt, see the doors marked with blood, and the Red Sea parted as God’s holy people walked through on dry land. I wanted to stay at the mountain, but I didn’t quite know why. And then I thought about the shoes of Moses. That seemed a little strange to me, and maybe it seems strange to you too. After all, there’s a burning bush and the voice of the Lord, and I am thinking about footwear. Moses took his shoes off because the Lord said that he was on holy ground. And I wondered for a moment as I read this passage, where else do you take off your shoes? You take off your shoes when you are home. On that mountain, Moses was in the presence of the Lord. He was home. You take off your shoes when you are home.
Many of us think of home as a safe place, but that is not everyone’s experience. For some, home is a place of acceptance, love, safety, welcome, and joy. For others, it is a place of hunger, violence, abuse, anger, grief and isolation. For some, the idea of home is a comfort and for others it is a crisis. That is the sad reality. But in our home here, in the parish of Our Lady of Lourdes, in this place and in this space, we want to be the home of love, acceptance, safety, welcome, and joy. We want to be that, even if we are not completely there yet. We want to be a place and a community that we can call home.
The younger son doesn’t think he can go home. He wasted so much. He’s wasted so much money, so much time, so much energy, so much of his life. He doesn’t think he can go home, at least not the same way. Maybe he can become a servant in his father’s house. Maybe his brother will give him a job and a place to live. The younger son could not imagine that he would be welcome at the family table ever again. He rehearses his speech to his father as walks the long road to his father’s house. “I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son.” We know this speech. Maybe we have rehearsed it ourselves. And when the younger son says to the father, “I am no longer worthy to be called you son,” the father stops the speech. “Quickly,” the father says to his servants, “Quickly, get the robe and the ring and put sandals on his feet.”
The younger son who had walked so far away from the house of the father and had walked even farther back to the house of the father received a robe and a ring and sandals for his feet. These weren’t simply items of clothing. They were signs that this man was not a servant in the house, but a son in this home of his father. The robe and the ring were the symbols of his relationship and the sandals were the sign that he was free. He could walk again as a son of the father. The younger son would not be held in bondage to his sins or to his past. He was restored and renewed and set free at the word of the father. He was given the robe and the ring and the sandals for his feet. The younger son was home.
I think about the robe and the ring and the sandals for the feet as I sit in my confessional. In God’s name and by God’s power, I get to give them back. No matter how far you have wandered and no matter how long it has been, come home, and I will give you back your robe, and your ring, and the sandals for your feet. Amen.