Years ago the BBC had a program entitled “Desert Island Discs” in which celebrities were asked to compile a program of music they would want to have with them in the unlikely event they would be 

marooned on a desert island. I would suggest that the texts of today’s liturgy would be a good choice for any sojourn in such a setting. They present us with a single, coherent message about the absolute and unconditional mercy of God. Although the children of Israel were stiff-necked and recalcitrant, God withheld the punishment that was their due. Although David was an adulterer and a murderer, God washed him from his guilt and cleansed him of his sin. Although Paul was a blasphemer who persecuted the Church and was the foremost of sinners, God treated him mercifully and gave him the grace to be an apostle. The good news culminates in the reading from the fifteenth chapter of Luke’s Gospel. God relentlessly seeks out all those who are lost. Some of us are like the lost coin, simply in the wrong place at the wrong time. Others of us are lost because, in our native stupidity, we have left the common path and wandered off on our own. And some of us are in trouble because we have willfully abandoned our Father’s house and squandered our birth right in self-indulgence. Whatever the reason for our finding ourselves far from where we want to be, we can be sure of one thing: God is actively seeking us in our misery, wanting nothing else but to bring us to that place of joyful reconciliation, where whatever is lost is recovered and sinners are welcome to celebrate in the eternal banquet hall of heaven.

-Fr. Michael Casey, a Cistercian monk of Tarrawarra 

Abbey in Australia, is a well-known retreat master 

and lecturer, and the author of many books on 

spirituality