The Prodigal Sons

     The article begins by explaining the story of the Prodigal sons. Two brothers one older, one younger are given a share of their father's wealth. The oldest stayed and helped the father, managing organizing and working hard. The younger son spent his wealth on prostitutes and liquor and gambled it away. The younger son then returns home where the father greets him with an embrace and a feast. Indignant the older brother protests at such treatment of his bagabond sibling. The father explains to the eldest that he is with him all the time and all that is his also belongs to his eldest son. 

     This article compares the two sons to our society. The oldest brother is likened to the middle and upper-middle class, while he poorer classes of society are compared to the younger brother, who needs help getting on the right path. 

     The author of the article explains that with our society the story works because the father provides the younger brother with a community, and a means of getting better. And the older brother gains the chance to become less cold and calculating by means of accepting the younger. The younger brother could not simply be lectured into righteousness. And the poorer class of society cannot be lectured into being moor like the middle class. It hi lights how morality runs not through society, but through every person, through both brothers, who are of equal value in the eyes of their father.

http://mobile.nytimes.com/2014/02/18/opinion/brooks-the-prodigal-sons.html