In today’s Gospel, we hear of a king who gave a wedding feast. When the invited guests did not arrive, he sent his servants out to find them. But when they were not interested in coming, the king rejected them and sent his servants out onto the roads to invite anyone whom they could find to the banquet.
Jesus Christ often used the imagery of a wedding feast to explain the Kingdom of God. God had been reaching out to His people in the history of salvation that we read of in the Old Testament. Finally, in Jesus Christ, He so united Himself with humanity that this union can best be compared to that of marriage in which the Son of God unites Himself to His Church. God sends out His servants to invite all people to share in this union in the Church. The Gospel tells us that the servants gathered in all those whom they could find, both the good and the bad.
This clearly tells us that the wedding feast is for all people. None are excluded except for those who exclude themselves. However, this Gospel passage also strikes a discordant note by telling us of the man who had come to the banquet without a wedding garment. When the king saw him, he was speechless and insisted that he be thrown out into outer darkness “where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.”
This may sound rather unfair to us: How could the king invite all sorts of people to his banquet and then hold it against someone that he was not properly dressed? The Fathers tell us that this man represents a whole group of people and that his wedding garment represents something far more fundamental than mere clothes. The wedding garment in this passage symbolizes an inner attitude that the Fathers refer to as love, righteousness, and a genuine repentance.
We are all welcomed into the Church, the bad together with the good. But this welcome is only the first step, for what really matters is what happens in our hearts.