Once in awhile you discover a book whose title makes it leap off the shelf into your hands. Before you know it you are devouring the book and recommending it to friends. “Buy the book,” you say, “the title alone is worth the price and the author actually makes sense.” Just such a book is, “Get Out of My Life, But First Would You Drive Me and Cheryl to the Mall,” by Anthony Wolf. Parents of teenagers are most likely nodding their heads - they have heard this - but please wait until Mass is over before running out to Borders Books.

I don’t have to give away the content of this self-help book for exhausted and frustrated parents. You can already guess some of it. But what I would like to point out is that the theme of this book, “Get Out of My Life But First Would You Drive Me and Cheryl to the Mall” is also the theme of our first reading from Exekiel and our gospel parable of the two sons. Sometimes you wonder if humanity’s relationship with God is somewhat like a middle school attitude toward a parent. Does God only have teenagers to deal with? The scriptures today want us to look at defiance and obedience.

There is something in our human nature that wants to defy authority. Whether that authority is God, or a resolution of the United Nations Security Council or a 55 mile an hour speed limit or even a spouse’s instruction on how they wish us to do something. There is within us a spirit that responds with some level of defiance...”I know how to do this” we mumble. “I’ll do it my way,” we think.

The word “righteous” is not common in our vocabulary but it is an important religious term. It speaks of relationship - are we right with God - in agreement with God. Now “self-righteous” speaks of the person who would be considered arrogant - self-centered - “I know what is best” - “I am in charge, I don’t need to listen to or consider what others are saying.” Defiant or obedient ...self-righteous or righteous. There is a very real human struggle here. You might say it dates back to Adam and Eve in the Garden of Paradise. God asked them to trust Him - to enjoy all of creation but don’t do this, don’t eat of this tree. “ I have given you everything you need, trust me.” But something within the human spirit defies - “I will do it my way.” Defiance/obedience.

One important clarification here is that there are times when defiance is a necessary part of genuine resistance against true evil. The civil rights movement of the ‘60's is an example of such defiance. Obviously, the civil rights movement was neither adolescent defiance nor the kind of corrupt defiance found in our gospel parable. Defiance against evil is one thing but defiance against God is another.

The Greek author, Nikos Kazantzakis shares a story that when he was a young man he spent a summer in a monastery during which he had a series of conversations with an old monk. One day he asked the old monk: “Father, do you still do battle with the devil?” The old monk replied: “No, I used to, when I was younger, but now I have grown old and tired and the devil has grown old and tired with me. I leave him alone and he leaves me alone.” “So your life is easy then?” remarked Kazantzakis, “Oh no,” replied the monk, “it’s much worse, now I wrestle with God!”

There is a lot contained in that remark, “I wrestle with God.” Among other things, it suggests that the struggles in later life can be very different than what we struggle with earlier on. In the normal pattern of things, we spend the first half of our lives struggling with sensuality, greed, and sexuality, and spend the last half of our lives struggling with anger and forgiveness - and that anger is often, however unconsciously, focused on God. In the end, our real struggle is with God.

As Christians, at baptism and the renewals of our baptismal promises, we have said our “yes” to God many times. Our ‘yes’ to God speaks of a life of loving service, it speaks of a genuine forgiveness of those who have hurt us and the forgiveness of the disappointments in life, it speaks of a deep charity to the point of detachment that allows us to share our possessions and talents with others, it speaks of building an intimate and prayerful relationship with God, it speaks of a true stewardship that respects all of life and a grateful caring for creation, it speaks of saying to God, “Thy will be done” - not “Thy will be changed.”

We say ‘yes’ to God and a Christian way of life frequently. The parable today asks us how firm and committed that ‘yes’ is. Have our religious practices become merely rituals? Do we give the impression of being committed to our faith, but we know better. We may be just following the routine made firm by years of repetition. Our hearts may really not be in ‘it’ - our ‘yes’ truth be told, may really be a ‘no.’ How many of us suspect that if we wanted to make a truly authentic ‘yes’ to Christ and His service, we would have to make some serious changes in our lives.

This parable, like every parable should make us uncomfortable. The two sons teach us that promises can never take the place of performance and fine words can never be a substitute for fine deeds. We should not think that the parable has nothing to say to us. Part of us says ‘yes’ to God with our words, and part of us says ‘no’ to God with our deeds. We wrestle with God - we wrestle with integrity -it is a real struggle - God wants our words and our deeds.