Always All

A Homily for the 17th Sunday of Ordinary Time 2026

We’ve gotten it wrong! And we’ve gotten it wrong for so very long. We’ve even gotten it wrong in song. You may be familiar with the hymn: “You are the Center of My Life” where the singer envisions God as the center of his or her life. But that’s wrong! God is not the center of your life or mine. We are the Center of God’s Life and that realization changes everything!

There is a line from the well-worn, perhaps over-familiar, parable of the Prodigal Son that is meant to provoke a transformation in us. When the father speaks to the disgruntled Elder Son, he says: “You are with me always. All that I have is yours.” Both sons in the parable lose sight of that very spectacular proclamation made by the father… made by God on the lips of Christ… and so they reduce their lives to match the smallness of their perceived reality. The younger son grabs for what is his and wastes it. The elder son is as dutiful as he is spiteful. Which is exactly what happens when we shrink ourselves down to become the center of our own lives; while God is calling us to be the center of his.

With God it is Always All and nothing less. So, why do we repetitively choose less?

Recently I woke up very tired of myself. Exhausted by the usual rounds of negative thinking, repetitive shortcomings, the cycle of hope and despair. In that state I prayed, what I feel was a very sincere prayer. I prayed: “God remove me from the center of my life.” And God responded, not as I thought he might (or feared he might) but in a way I never expected. God said: “You are the Center of my Life. Therefore, you do not need to reduce yourself down to be the center of your own.”

We hear this same invitation throughout scripture. Not just in the parable of the Prodigal Son, but today in the Book of Kings, God says to Solomon: “There has never been anyone like you up to now, and after you there will be no one to equal you.” You do realize that applies to all of us? Up to now there has never been anyone like you or me. And after you and me there will be no one to equal us. And Jesus tells us in the gospel today: God is the seeker, we are the hidden treasure, the pearl of great price that he joyfully pursues and when he finds us he couldn’t be more thrilled!

This past Wednesday we celebrated the feast of St. Mary Magdalene. In the Office of Readings for the feast day there is an excerpt from the homilies of St. Gregory the Great. Gregory, reflecting on the moment when the Resurrected Christ pronounces Mary’s name, puts into the mouth of Christ the following words: “Recognize me as I recognize you; for I do not know you as I know others; I know you as yourself.” Christ does not know me as he knows you. He knows me as myself. Nor does he know you as he knows me. He knows you as yourself.

We are the Center of His Life!

Now, this could sound like an invitation to the worst kind of bloated, divinely-sanctioned, egotistical, self-centered reality! But in Reality it is actually the very opposite.

I got tired of myself because I felt intensely trapped in the little world that my ego likens to some vast universe. But it’s not. It’s constraining, constricting, confining and coercive. And worse, it keeps me centered on myself… always on myself.

For God to say to us: “You are the Center of My Life” blows apart the little world we too often shrink ourselves down to occupy. That truth expands us beyond ourselves… opens us to receive ourselves as God sees us and therefore to give ourselves away as we’ve been called to give the gift of ourselves away!

Jesus reminds us again today what the Kingdom of God is like. The Kingdom of God is like finding yourself (or better yet, letting yourself be found) at the Center of God’s Life.

With God it is Always All! So why choose less?