A Rose by any other name...

Wednesday of the Twentieth Week in Ordinary Time &
St. Rose of Lima

Readings for Wednesday
Biographical Information about St. Rose of Lima

Reflection:

We can’t resist taking the Gospel from yesterday and comparing it with today’s selection from St. Matthew’s Gospel.

Yesterday, the Gospel concluded with;

“But many who are first will be last, and the last will be first.”

Today the Lord concludes his parable with;

“Thus, the last will be first, and the first will be last.”

The Lord just reiterated a phrase that is apparently very important to the disciples. It begs the question; who will be first and last and does it matter? Clearly it matted to the disciples. Following the discourse on the ability of the wealthy person to get into heaven, Jesus told the disciples that they would be joining him because of their faithfulness, but ended it with the first phrase from above.

Following that statement he launched into the parable of the day laborers, again ending the lesson with the same statement (I do not know why the order of the phrases is reversed.). Looking at the story today, we see a landowner (representing the Lord) going out to hire day laborers (at the time he was telling the story, he was speaking to his disciples, so they are the first day laborers. We can hear this truth and understand he is referring to us, his modern day disciples.).

He goes out 5 times in total; at dawn, at 9:00, at noon, and again at 3:00 and 5:00 in the afternoon. Each time he goes out, he finds more people to work in his vineyard (The vineyard is the Lord’s analogy for the Kingdom of heaven. That is made clear at the beginning.). The subtext here is that when the Lord calls, people hear the call at different times of their life.

At the end of the day, all those who answered the call are given the same wage. The story makes us wonder, like the laborers who worked all day in the vineyard, is this just?

I am reminded of the story of the preacher and the bus driver who died and went to heaven. When they got there, St. Peter saw the bus driver and immediately went over and ushered him into heaven with great fanfare; choirs of angles and the whole shebang. He left the preacher just standing there.

The preacher stood for quite a while and was getting pretty upset. Finally, St. Peter came back and waved the preacher to follow him. There was no fanfare or choirs of angels. The preacher was indignant. He said to St. Peter; “Where is the justice of this? All my life I served God down on earth. I came up with that bus driver. He was little better than an agnostic. What gives?”

St. Peter answered. “You see reverend, it’s all about effectiveness. All those years you were down on earth preaching, people sat in the pews and slept. All those years he drove the bus, people sat in the back of his bus and prayed.”

I know the moral of the story is not the same but it is an interesting thought. What is important for us is that, just because we serve the Lord and have answered His call, we are not guaranteed a place at the front of the line. We are not automatically given some special accord because we did what the Lord has asked us to do. We have seen many times before that those to whom much is given, much more is expected. When we start to think about how good we are and how bad someone else is, let us remember; “Thus, the last will be first, and the first will be last.”

Pax