Readings:
Isaiah 55:6-9
Psalm 145:2-3, 8-9, 17-18
Philippians 1:20c-24, 27a
Matthew 20:1-16a

Many people have a hard time understanding this gospel reading from today’s perspective. Those hired in the “eleventh hour” received the same pay as those hired at dawn. “The story presupposes an everyday scene in first-century Galilee, particularly during harvest-time, where wealthy landowners hired temporary day workers, including small farmers who had lost their own land, in the market-place.”^[1] The primary theme of the parable is God’s generosity for all, which is not based on the amount of human efforts or on human thinking. The first reading from Isaiah proclaims: “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways my ways, says the Lord” (Isa. 55:8).

However, this parable also illustrated the phrase that is the last verse before today’s scripture selection: “But many who are first will be last, and the last will be first” (Mt 19:30). The “first” who will be “last” are those who started work in the early morning, the Jews who were invited before the Gentiles into the covenant, or rich persons highlighted in the preceding chapter of Matthew (19:23-24). Those who started the work first were the last ones paid, and they grumbled about this. Even the disciples grumbled in the previous chapter of Matthew when they felt they wouldn’t get their just “reward” for following Jesus (Mt 19:27). This is unfortunately a common human reaction, even for the disciples.

In various ways, we sometimes feel like we are gifted and the “first” and that this should give us privileges. This can lead to a sense of superiority over others. While our culture, race, and nationality are gifts that provide meaning, identity, and order, these identities can be used to judge others. Interculturality is a counter-cultural vision which proposes mutually enriching and challenging relationships among those who are different from ourselves.

Ordination is a gift not primarily for an individual, but it is intended to be a gift of service and ministry for the church and ultimately for the mission of God. But often ordination can lead to a sense of superiority over those who are not ordained. Clericalism is a real danger for the church. The second reading from Philippians states, “conduct yourselves in a way worthy of the gospel of Christ” (1:27a).

Gender is also a gift. Being male has its gifts (as being female has its gifts).  However, sadly, this often can lead to a sense of superiority and misuse of power by men over women in various contexts and cultures. In the first letter to the Corinthians, Paul pleads that, “none of you will be inflated with pride in favor of one person over against another” (4:6b).

The attitudes and worldviews of considering ourselves as being “first” with privileges, like the laborers who began at dawn in the gospel, are rampant throughout our personal, communal, societal, and church contexts. This is contrary to who the God of generosity is, and who we are called to me as the church and as Christians. This verse from Galatians is well known: “There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in Christ” (3:28).

Usually, this presumption of privilege is unconscious. Sometimes, we can become aware of this through prayer and deep reflection on our own experience. Also, feedback can come from others, if there is safe space for giving it and an openness to receiving it. We are called to think and act differently as missionary disciples of the Way.

“Only, conduct yourselves in a way worthy of the gospel of Christ” (Phil 1:27a).

Roger Schroeder, SVD
Louis J. Luzbetak, SVD, Chair of Mission and Culture

[1] Ian Boxall, “Matthew,” in The Jerome Biblical Commentary for the Twenty-First Century, Third Fully Revised Edition, edited by Collins, Hens-Piazza, Reid, and Senior (London, et al: t&tclark, 2022), 1213.