Because the coordinator was late some of the graduation guests occupied what they thought were non-reserved seats. Some ushers, realizing the mistake, requested the guests to please vacate these for the graduates themselves. One of them felt so aggrieved he threatened to sue for undue embarrassment. Some felt distress at this; others more calmly advised that this was just a heated reaction. “How very un-Filipino,” was an observation made by a third.

How very unbefitting of a follower of Jesus, so the Gospel of today would read for some.  As with many of his parables, Jesus was taking common wisdom and relating it to the kingdom. Jesus was not referring to good manners, or social strategy; this is not a parable about being a good guest primarily. It is also about guests assuming more about themselves in relation to their hosts or other guests – if one reads “God” instead of “host” and Gentiles as the other guests. In the kingdom we do not assign our places; they are assigned to us by God.

A careful reading will show that if the first parable focused on the guest, the second parable highlights the host. I have a niece who now and then celebrates her birthday by treating a batch of disadvantaged children to lunch at Jollibee. She feels good doing good, which proves the saying, “virtue is its own reward.” But she is not unaware of the deeper point, so clear in Jesus’ message: the only way you can understand God is to act like God – not in the sense of power, but in the sense of unconditional love, of sharing that seeks no return at all. This is a point that is readily made cognitively; it is another thing to try at least once in one’s life, to be like God as dinner host to persons we could never imagine as guests at our table.