26th Sunday in Ordinary Time – Year A
Matthew 21:28-32
GOSPEL REFLECTION
- First reading – Ezekiel 18:25-28
When the sinner renounces sin, he shall certainly live - Second reading – Philippians 2:1-11
There must be no competition among you, no conceit; but everybody is to be self-effacing. Always consider the other person to be better than yourself, so that nobody thinks of his own interests first but everybody thinks of other people’s interests instead. In your minds you must be the same as Christ Jesus. - Gospel
Jesus said to the chief priests and elders of the people, ‘What is your opinion? A man had two sons. He went and said to the first, “My boy, you go and work in the vineyard today.” He answered, “I will not go,” but afterwards thought better of it and went. The man then went and said the same thing to the second who answered, “Certainly, sir,” but did not go. Which of the two did the father’s will?’ ‘The first’ they said. Jesus said to them, ‘I tell you solemnly, tax collectors and prostitutes are making their way into the kingdom of God before you. For John came to you, a pattern of true righteousness, but you did not believe him, and yet the tax collectors and prostitutes did. Even after seeing that, you refused to think better of it and believe in him.’
The land promised by God to his people is not just “flowing with milk and honey,” but also one in which wheat, oil, and wine abound … (Dt 8:6.10). “On that day, you will invite one another under your vines and fig trees” was the dream cultivated by every Israelite (Zec 3:10).
In a time like ours where everything is mechanized, attention is paid only to the quantity of a product and its commercial value. To talk about a loving relationship with one’s own vineyard would sound a bit naive and pathetic. It was not so in Israel. While he pruned, the peasant caressed, with the moving gaze of a lover, his own vineyard and addressed it with sweet and tender words. The poets have sung often this love and God used it to describe the passion that binds him to his people (Is 5:1-7). Israel is “my fruitful vineyard. Praise her! I, Yahweh, am its keeper; I water it every moment. So that no one will harm it, day and night I guard it” (Is 27:2-3).
Jesus has taken this several times: he spoke of posted workers, in diverse hours, to work in the vineyard (Mt 20:1-15), of the murderous tenants who do not want to deliver the fruits (Mt 21:33-40) and especially he presented himself as the “true vine” (Jn 15:1-8).
The parable of today’s Gospel depicts three characters: a father and two sons.
Jesus’ hearers sensed immediately that the father represents God, but they are surprised by the fact that he has two sons. The Son of God is only one, Israel; through the prophet Hosea, the Lord said: “Out of Egypt I called my son” (Hos 11:1) and to the Pharaoh, he said: “Israel is my firstborn son” (Ex 4:22). The Scripture says that only “the Jews are children of the Most High God” (Est 8,12q; 16:16) “children that will not disappoint” (Is 63:8). To hear about the two sons of God is disconcerting for an Israelite, but it is only the beginning, the continuation of the parable is even more provocative.
At the invitation of his father to go to work in the vineyard, the firstborn zealously and readily answered: Yes, Sir! (literally: I, Sir!; like saying, do not think of others, I’m there!), but then he did not go (v. 29). He does not say that, for listlessness or being seduced by an attractive proposition of friends, he simply changed his mind to ‘no’, even when he had said ‘yes’; he was not at all in accord with the program of his father. He had only spoken empty words.
It recalls another saying of Jesus: “Not everyone who says to me, Lord, Lord, will enter into the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my heavenly Father” (Mt 7:21).
This firstborn evidently represents the Israelites whom Moses had already called “degenerate children, a deceitful and crooked generation,” “unfaithful children” (Dt 32:5,20). Not all the Israelites, of course, but only those who, in words, had committed themselves to the covenant and then had reduced them to external rites, worthless ceremonies, convinced that they were right with the Lord because they offered sacrifices burnt, offerings and prayers. This, at the time of Jesus, was the religion practiced by the priests of the temple and the notables of the people. They did not produce the fruits willed by God: “He looked for justice, but found bloodshed; he looked for righteousness but heard cries of distress” (Is 5:7). The solemn liturgies were leaves, not fruits (Mt 21:18-22).
The provocations of the parable are not over. The father turned to the second son the request to go to work in the vineyard and the answer was: “I don’t want to.” But then, overcame with remorse, he went (v. 30).
The allusion to the hated Gentiles—who are now elevated to the status of children—is explicit. They have not given any formal adherence to the will of the Lord, but they entered first in the Kingdom of God.
When Matthew wrote this passage, fifty years have passed since the death and resurrection of Christ and the prophecy has already been realized: the Christian communities were composed mainly of former pagans, while the majority of the children of Abraham, who did not recognize Jesus as the Messiah of God, did not enter in the vineyard.
This finding may lead to the dangerous illusion that these two children are of prehistoric characters and have nothing to do with us. Christians would be the “third son,” the one who says ‘yes’ and does the will of the Father. They profess a clear faith and are free from theological errors. They commit themselves to observing the commandments and precepts and praising the Lord with songs and prayers.
But let’s ask ourselves what impact have our formulas, our statements, our formal stand, and our rituals in everyday life (Go to work today in the vineyard!)? Do they put an end to hatred, wars, and abuses? While continuing to profess ourselves as Christians, do we not easily resign ourselves to a life of compromise? Don’t we perhaps adapt to the criteria of this world and the good sense of people? Don’t we live perhaps with injustice, inequality, and discrimination?
The third child exists, but we are not that child. Only “the Son of God, Jesus Christ—Paul writes—was not ‘yes’ and ‘no,’ but with him, it was simply ‘yes.’ In him, all the promises of God have come to be a ‘yes’” (2Cor 1:19). He is the one who always said: “Yes, Father, this was your gracious will” (Mt 11:26).
The conclusion of the parable (vv. 31b-32) contains what is perhaps the most provocative statement of Jesus: “The tax collectors and the prostitutes are ahead of you in the Kingdom of God.” The verb is in the present; it is a fact: the public sinners who have no religious screen to hide themselves, those who cannot pretend because their condition is obvious to everyone, even to themselves, are at an advantage compared to those who consider themselves righteous. They felt safe and protected by the religious practices that they fulfill faithfully without even realizing their distance from the vineyard of the Lord.
“The publicans and the harlots” who know they are far from God do not delude themselves of doing his will. They are conscious of having said ‘no’; they do not try to fool themselves by fulfilling the precepts they themselves invented. They do not soothe the conscience with practices that have nothing in common with the true religion. Their awareness of being poor, weak, sinners in need of help, predisposes them to be first in receiving God’s gift.
The other brother will enter the vineyard when he stops to acknowledge himself just, when he renounces the pride of those who believe in their good works, when he recognizes his own hypocrisy and experiences disgust, when he abandons the certainties that arise from the fact that he had always said ‘yes’ to words and will rejoice at being saved by the gratuitous love of the Father.
Fernando Armellini
Italian missionary and biblical scholar
https://sundaycommentaries.wordpress.com
Privileged by Grace
Pope Francis
With his preaching on the Kingdom of God, Jesus opposes a religiosity that does not involve human life, that does not question the conscience and its responsibility in the face of good and evil. He also demonstrates this with the parable of the two sons, which is offered to us in the Gospel of Matthew (cf. 21:28-32). To the father’s invitation to go and work in the vineyard, the first son impulsively responds “no, I’m not going”, but then he repents and goes; instead the second son, who immediately replies “yes, yes dad”, does not actually do so; he doesn’t go. Obedience does not consist in saying “yes” or “no”, but always in taking action, in cultivating the vineyard, in bringing about the Kingdom of God, in doing good. With this simple example, Jesus wants to go beyond a religion understood only as an external and habitual practice, which does not affect people’s lives and attitudes, a superficial religiosity, merely “ritual”, in the ugly sense of the word.
The exponents of this “façade” of religiosity, of which Jesus disapproves, in that time were “the chief priests and the elders of the people” (Mt 21:23), who, according to the Lord’s admonition, will be preceded in the Kingdom of God by “tax collectors and prostitutes” (cf. v. 31). Jesus tells them: “the tax collectors, meaning the sinners, and the harlots go into the kingdom of God before you”. This affirmation must not lead us to think that those who do not follow God’s commandments, those who do not follow morality, saying, “In any case, those who go to Church are worse than us”, do well. No, this is not Jesus’ teaching. Jesus does not indicate publicans and prostitutes as models of life, but as “privileged by Grace”. And I would like to underscore this word, “grace”. Grace. Because conversion is always a grace. A grace that God offers to anyone who opens up and converts to him. Indeed, these people, listening to his preaching, repented and changed their lives. Let us think of Matthew, for example. Saint Matthew, who was a publican, a traitor to his homeland.
In today’s Gospel, the one who makes the best impression is the first brother, not because he said “no” to his father, but because after his “no” he converted to “yes”, he repented. God is patient with each of us: he does not tire, he does not desist after our “no”; he leaves us free even to distance ourselves from him and to make mistakes. Thinking about God’s patience is wonderful! How the Lord always waits for us; he is always beside us to help us; but he respects our freedom. And he anxiously awaits our “yes”, so as to welcome us anew in his fatherly arms and to fill us with his boundless mercy. Faith in God asks us to renew every day the choice of good over evil, the choice of the truth rather than lies, the choice of love for our neighbour over selfishness. Those who convert to this choice, after having experienced sin, will find the first places in the Kingdom of heaven, where there is greater joy for a single sinner who repents than for ninety-nine righteous people (cf. Lk 15:7).
But conversion, changing the heart, is a process, a process that purifies us from moral encrustations. And at times it is a painful process, because there is no path of holiness without some sacrifice and without a spiritual battle. Battling for good; battling so as not to fall into temptation; doing for our part what we can, to arrive at living in the peace and joy of the Beatitudes. Today’s Gospel passage calls into question the way of living a Christian life, which is not made up of dreams and beautiful aspirations, but of concrete commitments, in order to always open ourselves to God’s will and to love for our brothers and sisters. But this, even the smallest concrete commitment, cannot be made without grace. Conversion is a grace we must always ask for: “Lord, give me the grace to improve. Give me the grace to be a good Christian”.
May Mary Most Holy help us to be docile to the action of the Holy Spirit. He is the One who melts the hardness of hearts and disposes them to repentance, so we may obtain the life and salvation promised by Jesus.
Angelus 27/9/2020
“Go today…!” Mission is today
Romeo Ballan
The main characters are a father and two sons, with an important task to carry out together, in collaboration, without backing away. The episode is told by Jesus in the parable (Gospel), with the invitation-command to go and work in the vineyard, that is, for the extension of God’s Kingdom in the world. It is a reiteration of the message of last Sunday concerning the work in God’s field, conversion of heart, gratuity of love and service, acceptance of the plan of God the Father… The Lord is not satisfied with words, he expects results: “It is not those who say to me, ‘Lord, Lord’, who will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the person who does the will of my Father in heaven” (Mt 7:21). The word of Jesus and the message of the parable are a strong call to conversion and coherence between faith and works. A warning that is evident in the repeated debates-controversies between Jesus and the Pharisees. When Matthew, some decades after the death and resurrection of Jesus, wrote these texts, the Christian communities were mainly composed of people coming from paganism, while the majority of the children of Israel had not recognized Jesus as the promised Messiah and had, therefore, refused to enter into the vineyard. The prophecy of Jesus had already come true: “Tax collectors and prostitutes are making their way into the kingdom God before you” (v. 31). This word does not give rise to a gradation of merit or to best places; it indicates only a willingness and openness to the new of God. The parable assures us that our good Father does not refuse the work done late, that accepts changes of mind and even welcomes those who seem the most unworthy, if they repent and believe (v. 32). Because he is a very special God, who reveals his “greatness of heart above all by his unbounded kindness” (Prayer).
The two sons in the parable are two peoples (Israel and the Gentiles), two hearts with ups and downs and two sides of same coin. In reality, the two children are each one of us, with our ups and downs, our inconsistencies, in a mix of Yes and No, between times of fidelity and of weakness, depending on the phases and periods of our life… Already by the end of the first Christian century (more than 1900 years ago!), St. Ignatius of Antioch wrote: “Better to be Christians without saying so than to say so without being one!”
In contrast to the first two sons, with their Yes and No, there is a third son, which is not us: Jesus, the Son of the Father, who knows and carries out just one word: the Yes of God for the salvation of humankind (cf. 2Cor1:19; Mt 11:26). The majestic Christological hymn of Paul to the Philippians (II Reading) is a prayerful contemplation, faced with the mystery of Christ Jesus: He is God, like the Father and the Spirit, but he empties himself to become as men are, makes himself an obedient servant, humbles himself to accepting death on the Cross. But God raises him above all others, to the point that every tongue proclaims that “Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father” (v. 11). Christ did not seek “his own interests, but rather those of others” (v. 4). He, the Missionary of the Father, has given his life for all. Therefore, every Christian, every missionary, is called to follow his example, taking on “the same feelings of Jesus Christ” (v.5): love, humility, compassion, total self-sacrifice. He is the way of Mission.
The command of the father to his sons is clear: “Son, today go and work in the vineyard” (v. 28). An episode of country life that links us to another call by Jesus to note that the harvest is ready: “Look around you, look at the fields: already they are white, ready for the harvest” (Jn 4:35). It is an abundant harvest, for which the labourers are, sadly, too few (cf Mt.9:37). The command is clear and very relevant: “Son, today go…” is a command for our time. It’s for today! With the Missionary month of October and World Mission Sunday on top of us, it is easy to identify the vineyard of the parable with the missionary world, where the work for the Kingdom is proverbially immense, while the work-force (personnel and means) is lamentably small. The command of Jesus is linked to the command given by the priest at the end of the Latin Mass: ‘Ite, missa est!’,which means: Go, it is time for mission!
The apostle Paul received one day the command of Jesus: “Go … among the Gentiles.” From that moment his only answer was Yes, for life, to bring the Gospel to the Gentiles. Before the missionary task, which belongs to everyone, everyone is called to respond responsibly. It appealed to the prophet Ezekiel (I reading) with an invitation to act with righteousness and justice, to live and not die (v. 27-28). The call of Jesus to work in his vineyard is urgent, for the good of humanity that is suffering and awaiting redemption. Christ expects from each one a personal, free and reliable response.
