Sept. 20, 2020: 25th Sunday A
Sept. 20, 2020: 25th Sunday A
How many parents here have heard the following grumbles from your children when they were younger? “Why do I need to put the dishes away and she doesn’t?” “Why do I have to take out the trash and he doesn’t?” “Why does she get a new car and I don’t?” Underlying these complaints is the question of whether one is being treated fairly. Early in our lives, we wrestle with the temptation of envy. In the scripture, the earliest instance of envy is in Adam and Eve’s children, Cain and Abel. Cain was envious of Abel because God seemed to favor Abel’s offerings. While Cain had a free choice to resist the evil of envy, he persisted in harboring anger for his brother and committed a heinous act against his own flesh and blood.
What is envy? Envy is “painful or resentful awareness of an advantage enjoyed by another and with a desire to possess the same advantage.” We learn in the Old Testament that it was the sin of envy that Lucifer chose to rebel against God and His Holy Angels. Ever since his fall from Heaven, Satan has tempted countless generations of humanity to rebel against God. In a way, Satan is using the sin of envy to divide the solidarity of humanity into the camps of the haves vs have-nots, the privileged vs the ordinary, and the chosen vs the neglected. Satan has been trying to convince humanity that God the Father favors only a select few and that someone will always be short changed.
Even in the time of Jesus, it was a common belief that salvation must be earned. The Pharisees believed that adhering meticulously to the religious law put a person on the path to salvation while those who did not observe the law were rejected by God. Jesus who knew the Heavenly Father and the Kingdom of God put forth the Parable of the Workers in the Vineyard to shatter the lies about God’s Kingdom that have been perpetuated by religious leaders of the time. The first lesson of the parable is that God wants to call everyone to work for his Kingdom, and not just a select few. In the parable, the vineyard owner himself goes out all day looking to hire workers. The second lesson of the parable is that God wants to give everyone the same reward, that is salvation and eternal life. From a market economy mindset, this generosity seems unjust and unfair; in our financial economy the reward earned is commensurate with merit and hardwork. How can God give a person who has been faithful and diligent for God all her life the same reward as the person who only lately began to live a virtuous life?
This paradox begins to make sense if we understand God through the lens of His mercy. Sometime ago, an adult sibling approached me about how he was upset that his mother was spending too much money and energy on her grown daughter who seemed lazy and opportunistic. The son alleged that his mother was enabling his sister and making the problem worse. Perhaps what was unsaid was that the brother was envious that his sister was getting all the attention from his mother. The mother reminded her son that she was thankful to God that she didn’t have to worry about her son. However, she told him that this was a time that his sister needed someone to affirm her and encourage her so that she can get back on the path of reaching her potential.
None of us deserve God’s mercy and salvation. The poor fishermen, tax collectors, prostitutes, cradle Catholics, former atheists, and new converts are all welcomed by God as disciples as was Blessed Mother, John the Baptist, and the Apostles. There are no rankings in the kingdom of God—who is up, who is down, who is popular, who is significant. There is no room in God's kingdom for personal pride, for envy, and for contempt. God comes looking for each of us to provide us with a life of significance in His Kingdom. St. Paul reminded the Ephesians, “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—not by works, so that no one can boast. For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.” (Eph 2:8-10) Our labor for the Lord should be simply our loving gratitude for all that Our Lord is doing in us.
