Today, third Sunday of Lent, the evangelical reading contains Jesus' call to penance and conversion. Or, rather, a demand for a change in our lives.
In Evangelical language “To convert to” means to change not only our innermost attitude but our exterior style, too. It is one of the mostly employed parables in the Gospel. Remember that, before the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, saint John the Baptist summarized his advocation with the same saying: «Preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins» (Mk 1:4). And, immediately after, Jesus preaching can be summarized with these words: «Repent and believe the good news!» (Mk 1:15).
Yet, today's reading has some characteristics of its own that request faithful attention and an adequate answer. It can be said that the first part, with the two historic references (the Galileans' blood shed by Pilate and the crumbling of the Siloh tower), contains a threat. It is impossible to call it any other way!: we deplore the two misfortunes —regretted and moaned at the time— but Jesus Christ, most seriously, says to all of us: —«Unless you change your ways, you will all perish as they did» (Lk 13:5).
This shows us two basic things. In the first place, the total seriousness of the Christian commitment. And, secondly, if we do not respect it, as God commands, the possibility of our death, not in this world but, much worse, in the other one: the eternal doom. These two deaths in our text are nothing but examples of another death, that cannot be compared to the first one.
Each one of us will eventually find out how to face this demand of personal change. Nobody is excluded. But if this may worry us, the second part should confort us, instead. The “gardener”, who is Jesus, begs the owner of the vineyard, his Father, to wait another year. And, in the meanwhile, He will do whatever possible (and the impossible, by dying for us) so that the vineyard may bear fruit. That is, we change our ways! This is the message of Lent. Let us, therefore, take it seriously. The saints —though late in his life saint Ignatious of Loyola is one instance— do change by God's grace while inciting us to change too.