Sometimes it’s incomprehensible how easily we reject what’s important and get lost in trivialities. Commenting this Sunday on the parable of the wedding banquet, Pope Leo XIV reminded us that goodness naturally tends to communicate itself—as Saint Thomas Aquinas already pointed out when he affirmed that “Bonum dicitur diffusivum sui ,” goodness is diffusive in itself—and that God invites us to a dazzling feast. That splendid table is none other than the image of Heaven, the fullness to which we are called.

However, the parable shocks us because it portrays a very common refusal. Faced with the king’s offer, the guests choose to ignore the invitation: “they leave and go about their own business .” It seems absurd to us, but we often do the same. We live with our heads bowed under the weight of material needs and the noise of daily life, acting as if this world were our only horizon.

It’s true that the Christian life isn’t about walking around with a calculator in hand, measuring actions solely by the final reward or turning faith into a transaction of merits. This attitude of always being preoccupied with what’s gained or rewarded often resembles the closed-mindedness of teenagers, who negotiate everything and put a price on everything. Authentic love doesn’t work that way. Jesus doesn’t want us to have the mentality of earnest collectors, but rather to be simple like children, capable of surrendering ourselves to his grace and his infinite mercy.

But living with such filial simplicity doesn’t mean diminishing the importance of existence. It’s not about speculating about the afterlife, but about understanding that the present lacks a compass if we forget where we are headed. As the Pope so aptly pointed out, the banquet hall of this mystery is “our churches, our homes, the places where we live, and where each day the Son of the King, Jesus Christ, returns to declare his love for us and awaits our ‘yes’ .” It is there, in the apparent monotony of the hours, that we lay people truly put everything on the line. We risk eternity in how we face work fatigue without succumbing to cynicism, in the patience with which we welcome our spouse at the end of an exhausting day, in the care of our elderly parents, or in the quiet honesty with which we fulfill our professional obligations when no one is watching. Every ordinary decision, every small sacrifice made out of love, and every act of magnanimity in the face of others’ rudeness sculpts the very fabric of our souls.

However, the Gospel parable offers us one last unsettling warning with the guest who crashed the party but lacked the proper attire. It is not enough to be formally present or to attend out of inertia; the Pope reminded us that we come to this banquet “dressed, like the bride, in the white mantle of Baptism and adorned with the jewels of good works . “

This wedding garment does not spring from sterile willpower, but from the wellsprings of grace. We make ourselves worthy of the feast by frequently attending the sacraments—especially Holy Mass and the confessional, where God’s mercy washes away our stains—and by nourishing our souls with attentive and meditative reading of the Gospel. It is a garment that is embroidered daily with the vibrant brocade of the works of mercy, both corporal and spiritual. To appear before God with a garment worn thin by lukewarmness or routine is to empty faith of its true meaning.

The beautiful thing is that this feast is not just a distant promise. Jesus promised the “hundredfold” here on earth. Heaven begins to be experienced here when we know how to live from grace, responding with a joy that—in the words of Leo XIV— “is not artificial, but deep, concrete, real, beautiful like the faces of the people we meet, true like the work, the smiles, the tears, the handshakes, the acts of kindness in our days . “

Disregarding the banquet to attend to the world’s worries is a bad deal. It’s wise to lift our eyes from time to time, remember that we are invited to a grand feast, and respond with a daily “yes” that begins to transform our ordinary lives into the prologue to eternity.