25th Sunday of Ordinary Time A

    The grumbling of those who have worked all day is similar to the

grumbling of the elder Brother in the Parable of the Prodigal Son.  Like

the Prodigal Son we never know what they did in response to the owner’s

answer.

    Act I: hirings.

    At the outset there is a surprising note.  The householder (and not

his steward) goes out from “early in the morning” until the eleventh hour

to assemble the workers.  The hearers are given a hint that their normal

view of the world is to be challenged.  Different wage agreements: first

group: normal days’s wage; hired in the third hour: whatever is right;

hired in the sixth and ninth hour: presumably “whatever is right”;

eleventh hour: no mention of payment. 

    Act II: payments_

    the owner of the vineyard said to his foreman

    Normally those who had worked l2 hours would be the first to be

paid.  If that had happened, they would have left happy.  But the

reversal,inversion, in the order of pay lets those who had worked all day

find out what the others have received.  As we stand with the workers

and watch the payment, when those who are hired last receive a denarius,

we begin to have the same feelings as those hired first they thought that they would receive more

    Act III Dialogue between the owner and the grumbling workers:

    l)I am not cheating you. 

    2) Or am I not free to do as I wish with my own money? 

    3) I question your attitude. Are you envious because I am generous?’

    The complaint of the dissatisfied workers is, strictly speaking, you

have made them equal to us.  They are defining their personal worth in

contrast to others;  they are not so much angered by what happened to

them as envious of the good fortune of the other workers.  They are so

enclosed in their understanding of justice that it becomes a norm by

which they become judges of others.  They want to order the world by

their norms which limit the master’s freedom and exclude unexpected

generosity._

    The line between following God’s will and deciding what God wills is

always thin and fragile. 

    The grumblers claim that making one hour equal to those who have

worked all day is unfair.  The first group of workers have at the end of

the story exactly what they had contracted for in the beginning.  They

would have been satisfied with that if it had not been for the treatment

given the group that only worked one hour.

    Notice that they are never denied their reward, just their

complaint.  Whatever they lose, they lose in their own feelings of

hostility and resentment.

    We human beings are curious.  When we look at someone who is the

beneficiary of some generosity we want a strict system of justice.  But

if we are the beneficiary of some generosity we wonder at those who have

complaints.  They are just jealous.

    For who among us does not yearn to find a welcome, a helping hand,

an unexpected privilege, even when we do not deserve it.

    Jesus showed us that God does not love us because we are wonderful,

but rather, we are wonderful (or can be) because God loves us.  DO I

LOVE YOU BECAUSE YOU’RE WONDERFUL OR ARE YOU WONDERFUL BECAUSE I LOVE YOU?