In the Gospel today (Mt. 20:1-16), we hear a story we have probably heard before. And it may strike us as a little strange. We don’t have vineyards on this side of the island, and New England is not known as wine country. None of us make our living by day labor. We may actually hire day labor every now and then, so the landowner’s generosity in the story may indeed seem odd. It is probably not something you or I would do. That, of course, is exactly Jesus’ point.

Mass of September 24, 2023

Perhaps it may be helpful to put this story into a 21st-Century context, so it will sound to us the way it did to Jesus’ listeners. So, let me try. In my 25-year career in the hotel industry, I worked for some odd and unusual owners. But imagine such an owner who hired a managing director for his luxury hotel and paid him $300,000 a year. Then imagine him hiring department managers and paying them each $300,000 a year. And then imagine him setting a pay scale of $150 per hour for hourly employees, for each one from the desk clerks, maids and cooks right down to the dishwashers and laundry workers. $150 an hour for a normal fulltime employee would add up to $300,000 a year. And then imagine this bizarre owner insisting on paying the same rate for part-time employees and paying them for a full 40 hour week no matter how few hours they worked.

Such an owner would have to have unlimited financial resources outside of the income the hotel produced, which would never support such a pay scale. He would, however, have the best possible workers beating down his doors begging for jobs. He would have his pick of the best, and his hotel would have amazing service. But the Managing Director and the other executives probably wouldn’t be too happy. Some of them went to Cornell University’s Hotel Administration School, and they’re still paying off student loans. They would think it only fair that they be paid more, regardless of their employment contracts. How does this business model strike you? Pretty crazy, no doubt. Most of us probably identify more with the managing director or other managers. But if you were someone with a minimum or low wage job, trying to pay a college tuition or to support a family with that low paying job this model would sound pretty good to you. You would sure want to work for this owner.

That, of course, is Jesus’ other point. Just as it was in Jesus time economic justice is an issue in today’s world. We do have day laborers in our country, many of them children, working in agriculture, picking the vegetables we eat, for very low pay and in terrible conditions. In this, the most prosperous nation in the world, 38 million people, 11.6 % of the population, live in poverty. We have food pantries and soup kitchens which feed thousands of these people in many other countries thousands scavenge in garbage dumps. But in God’s kingdom, which is what Jesus is talking about in this parable, things are very different. There is no garbage. God runs his business much differently than you or I would, and he doesn’t worry about making a profit. He already has everything, absolutely everything, anyway... and nothing and no one is wasted. As the prophet Isaiah says in the first reading: The Lord says: my thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways my ways. God looks out for us that we may profit. He wants us all to have a place in his kingdom, no matter what our job or state of life is, no matter when we wake up to his offer, no matter how we may have wasted our time or our lives before, no matter what time we get there.

Abbot Michael Brunner

It’s what we all are made for, why He created humanity, and His kingdom is the only place in which we will be truly happy and fulfilled. The sooner we realize that and give ourselves over to the living of real Christian life, kingdom citizenship, the sooner we will begin to enjoy that happiness in its partial form in this life on earth. I can attest to that. I’m one of those who got hired at three in the afternoon. But even if we are one of those that only come to this realization and come to embrace it at the end of our life, we will come into the very same kingdom of God as we begin our life in the next one. It’s worth noting, however, that we can’t realize it or embrace it without trying, without some effort on our part. One thing my story doesn’t include that Jesus’ story does is the fact that even when the workday was almost over some hopeful workers were still in the marketplace looking for and hoping for work. We won’t get hired by the generous owner without making ourselves available, without applying for a job, for a place in God’s kingdom. It won’t happen by accident or luck.

Now we can imagine many things about that state of being we call heaven. Jesus tells us that there, in his father’s kingdom, there are many mansions, some bigger than others, but we can be pretty sure that the way God assigns them is very different from the way you or I would. The owner in Jesus’ story asks the disgruntled employees: Are you envious because I am generous? Am I not free to do as I wish with my own money? In our world today, we certainly are free to do as we wish with our money and property and time, and our country gives us more opportunity to spend on things than any other society that has ever existed. And perhaps we as a society overindulge in doing what we please with money and property and time, in spending it on pleasure and consumer goods rather than what is truly good for us and our society. And many of the things that we spend money on are disposable. They end up being thrown away, especially clothing that only gets worn a few times before being discarded. We throw away perfectly good food. Our cities are surrounded by mountainous landfills. People too are prone to be treated as disposable merchandise.

But God throws nothing away, though He gives away his gifts very generously. So, it’s surprising so many people run away from him, so foolishly. God only wants the best for us and will give us the best if we do things, live life in the way He established for our human nature to experience happiness. His way is a way of love and service; of our spending our time and energy and resources on others and for others: those in our family, our community, our school, our church, on those who love and follow God, and especially on those who have only God to rely on. Those, the most unfortunate, the poor, the homeless and sick are especially our ticket into the kingdom of God.

This way of love and service is called servant leadership and “stewardship”. We can call it servant studentship, parentship, citizenship, servant believership or church membership. We know that other story Jesus told two weeks ago of servants being given large sums of money, called talents, which they were to invest and use to build up the master’s estate. Those who did use them were promoted and became stewards, responsible managers of many estates. We are born into this world to use what gifts and talents we have for others. The Church and religion are often criticized by some for focusing on the next world and ignoring this one. But nothing could be further from the truth. True and real religion focuses on God by focusing on what is lasting and of the highest quality in this world, on the love and virtue with which we clothe our souls and which we take with us into the next. To be truly religious is to focus on using this world constructively to the very best of our ability to get us, along with our brothers and sisters, into the next world, our permanent home in the presence of God.

Saint Paul says it in his letter today to the Philippians: I long to depart this life and be with Christ, for that is far better; yet that I remain in the flesh is more necessary for your benefit. What benefit? The next world will be better, but each of us must do our part to make this world better than it is now, during our time. That is good stewardship. That is good servantship. That is being a good worker in the vineyard worth what the owner is paying. You have many opportunities to do and be that right here, perhaps the most significant of which is to participate in community service, which helps those most in need right here on Aquidneck island and in Rhode Island. May God bring you successfully to the place of happiness, a mansion of just the right size, he has lovingly prepared for you from all eternity.