“There’s so much evil in the world, and so many people are suffering from other people’s sins that there must be retribution, some justice. Don’t tell me that the people who are doing these things – from molesting children to ignoring all morality – are going to be in heaven when we get there! What would that say about God’s justice?” That is something almost all of us have reiterated at some point in life, especially after witnessing the senseless loss of life by mankind’s own hands. At least, Fr. Ron Rolheiser writes, we’re in good company; as was the case for the prophet Isaiah, this was no different. For him it was not enough that the Messiah should usher in heaven for good people. Along with rewards for the good, he felt, there also needed to be a “day of vengeance” on the bad. Interestingly, in a curious omission, when Jesus quotes this text to define his own ministry, he leaves out the part about vengeance. All that worry that somebody might be getting away with something and all that anxiety that God might not be an exacting judge suggest that we, like the older brother of the prodigal son, might be doing many things right but are missing something important inside of ourselves. We are dutiful and moral but bitter underneath and are unable to enter the circle of celebration and the dance. Too often, for too many of us, far from basking in gratitude in the beautiful symphony of relaxed, measureless love and infinite forgiveness that makeup heaven, we feel instead the bitterness, self-pity, anger, and incapacity to let go and dance that was felt by the older brother of the prodigal son. Like the older brother of the prodigal son, we protest our right to despair and to be unhappy and demand that a reckoning justice one day give us our due by punishing the bad. In the end, it’s mostly because we are wounded and bitter that we worry about God’s justice, that it might be too lenient, that the bad will not be fully punished. But we should worry less about that and more about our own incapacity to forgive, to let go of our hurts, to take delight in life, to give others the gaze of admiration, to celebrate, and to join in the dance. To be fit for heaven, we must let go of bitterness and embrace the love of others, which is so very hard to do for so many of us.