Catechism Links [1]
CCC 755: The Church as God’s vineyard
CCC 1830-1832: Gifts and fruits of the Holy Spirit
CCC 443: Prophets are the servants, Christ is the Son
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“The Heir of the Vineyard”
by James Tissot 1886-96 |
Readings for the Twenty-seventh Sunday in Ordinary Time [2]
Readings from the Jerusalem Bible [3]
Readings and Commentary: [4]
Reading 1: Isaiah 5:1-7
Let me now sing of my friend,
my friend's song concerning his vineyard.
My friend had a vineyard
on a fertile hillside;
he spaded it, cleared it of stones,
and planted the choicest vines;
within it he built a watchtower,
and hewed out a wine press.
Then he looked for the crop of grapes,
but what it yielded was wild grapes.
Now, inhabitants of Jerusalem and people of Judah,
judge between me and my vineyard:
What more was there to do for my vineyard
that I had not done?
Why, when I looked for the crop of grapes,
did it bring forth wild grapes?
Now, I will let you know
what I mean to do with my vineyard:
take away its hedge, give it to grazing,
break through its wall, let it be trampled!
Yes, I will make it a ruin:
it shall not be pruned or hoed,
but overgrown with thorns and briers;
I will command the clouds
not to send rain upon it.
The vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel,
and the people of Judah are his cherished plant;
he looked for judgment, but see, bloodshed!
for justice, but hark, the outcry!
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Commentary on Is 5:1-7
This selection marks the beginning of what is known as the “Song of the Vineyard.” Using the analogy of vineyard as the “hosts of the house of Israel,” the prophet first describes how the people had been prepared by the law and the prophets. The implication is that all preparations had been made to produce God’s intended result. However, the “stiff necked” people turned away from God “but see, bloodshed! for justice, but hark, the outcry!” Isaiah warns the people that God will cause the house of Israel to be destroyed. This is a clear reference to the Babylonian Exile which took place some 100-200 years following this prophecy.
CCC: Is 5:1-7 755
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Responsorial Psalm: Psalm 80:9, 12, 13-14, 15-16, 19-20
R. (Is 5:7a) The vineyard of the Lord is the house of Israel.
A vine from Egypt you transplanted;
you drove away the nations and planted it.
It put forth its foliage to the Sea,
its shoots as far as the River.
R. The vineyard of the Lord is the house of Israel.
Why have you broken down its walls,
so that every passer-by plucks its fruit,
The boar from the forest lays it waste,
and the beasts of the field feed upon it?
R. The vineyard of the Lord is the house of Israel.
Once again, O Lord of hosts,
look down from heaven, and see;
take care of this vine,
and protect what your right hand has planted
the son of man whom you yourself made strong.
R. The vineyard of the Lord is the house of Israel.
Then we will no more withdraw from you;
give us new life, and we will call upon your name.
O Lord, God of hosts, restore us;
if your face shine upon us, then we shall be saved.
R. The vineyard of the Lord is the house of Israel.
A vine from Egypt you transplanted;
you drove away the nations and planted it.
It put forth its foliage to the Sea,
its shoots as far as the River.
R. The vineyard of the Lord is the house of Israel.
Why have you broken down its walls,
so that every passer-by plucks its fruit,
The boar from the forest lays it waste,
and the beasts of the field feed upon it?
R. The vineyard of the Lord is the house of Israel.
Once again, O Lord of hosts,
look down from heaven, and see;
take care of this vine,
and protect what your right hand has planted
the son of man whom you yourself made strong.
R. The vineyard of the Lord is the house of Israel.
Then we will no more withdraw from you;
give us new life, and we will call upon your name.
O Lord, God of hosts, restore us;
if your face shine upon us, then we shall be saved.
R. The vineyard of the Lord is the house of Israel.
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Commentary on Ps 80:9, 12, 13-14, 15-16, 19-20
Psalm 80 is a communal lament. In these strophes the image of the vineyard is applied to the house of Israel. The destruction of the vineyard is also referenced in support of Isaiah’s imagery form Isaiah 5:1ff. The psalmist entreats the Lord to restore the people to favor and rescue them from their situation.
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Reading II: Philippians 4:6-9
Brothers and sisters:
Have no anxiety at all, but in everything,
by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving,
make your requests known to God.
Then the peace of God that surpasses all understanding
will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.
Finally, brothers and sisters,
whatever is true, whatever is honorable,
whatever is just, whatever is pure,
whatever is lovely, whatever is gracious,
if there is any excellence
and if there is anything worthy of praise,
think about these things.
Keep on doing what you have learned and received
and heard and seen in me.
Then the God of peace will be with you.
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Commentary on Phil 4:6-9
St. Paul begins this address, as part of a series of ethical instructions, by exhorting the Christian community to prayer. Through prayer, God’s peace will come into their hearts and minds as a gift from Christ Jesus. He calls upon them to meditate upon the great good that is provided through God and provides a litany of adjectives: true, honorable, just, pure, lovely, and gracious as descriptors of Christ’s actions in their midst. Through a focus on what is excellent they will achieve the peace of Christ.
CCC: Phil 4:6-7 2633; Phil 4:8 1803
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Gospel: Matthew 21:33-43
Jesus said to the chief priests and the elders of the people:
"Hear another parable.
There was a landowner who planted a vineyard,
put a hedge around it, dug a wine press in it, and built a tower.
Then he leased it to tenants and went on a journey.
When vintage time drew near,
he sent his servants to the tenants to obtain his produce.
But the tenants seized the servants and one they beat,
another they killed, and a third they stoned.
Again he sent other servants, more numerous than the first ones,
but they treated them in the same way.
Finally, he sent his son to them, thinking,
'They will respect my son.'
But when the tenants saw the son, they said to one another,
'This is the heir.
Come, let us kill him and acquire his inheritance.’
They seized him, threw him out of the vineyard, and killed him.
What will the owner of the vineyard do to those tenants when he comes?"
They answered him,
"He will put those wretched men to a wretched death
and lease his vineyard to other tenants
who will give him the produce at the proper times."
Jesus said to them, "Did you never read in the Scriptures:
The stone that the builders rejected
has become the cornerstone;
by the Lord has this been done,
and it is wonderful in our eyes?
Therefore, I say to you,
the kingdom of God will be taken away from you
and given to a people that will produce its fruit."
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Commentary on Mt 21:33-43
St. Matthew describes Jesus applying the Parable of the Vineyard as he confronts the Jewish leadership. His motivation is clearly to let them know that, by rejecting Jesus and his message about the Kingdom of God, they have forfeited their place in that kingdom. The description used for the vineyard is remarkably similar to Isaiah 5:1ff (above). Reference to the servants who were beaten and killed refers to the prophets similarly treated. The reference to the landowner’s son is an obvious reference to Jesus as the Son of God. The scripture quote of Psalm 118:22-23 was seen in the early church as a reference to Jesus’ resurrection. This is viewed as the vindication of the Lord and God.
“Our parable is lengthy and quite intricate, and for good reason: in symbolic language it contains the whole history of human salvation. It first looks backward to the election and formation of Israel by God and to the long line of prophets he sent to his people, culminating in the sending of his own Son at the Incarnation. It portrays graphically the long history of the brutal rejection of the prophets (including Jesus himself, the greatest of prophets, v. 46) by the leaders of Israel. And then looks forward, from this present moment of Jesus’ life, to his Passion and death at the hands of his own people, with the final triumph of the Resurrection as God’s ultimate saving deed that brings new life out of death [see the parable of the wedding feast Matthew 22:1-14].” [5]
CCC: Mt 21:33-43 & par. 755; Mt 21:34-36 443; Mt 21:37-38 443; Mt 21:42 & par.[6] 756
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Homily:
Today has been designated as “Safe Haven” Sunday in our diocese – the Diocese of Lansing. For those of us unfamiliar with the term in this context it is an attempt to make the home a safe haven for families. Safe from external elements of our world that will cause the spiritual life of the family to morally decay from the inside. The phrase “safe haven” originated with early sailors who were constantly threatened by the power of wind and waves that could destroy their ships or wash them into the sea. A safe haven or safe harbor was a place where they were safe from danger, secure from outside forces that could threaten their lives.
In days gone by, threats to a person’s moral code, enticements to sin, if you will, were minimal. In my day (the 1950’s and 60’s – note, that is 1900s not 1800s as some have suggested) temptation was limited to the “dirty magazines” sold in some drug stores. And even there, if a young person were to try to buy one, the stores would not sell them to you. In the better stores, these magazines were kept behind the counter and out of public view. There were bars and pool halls where young people were not allowed, protected by social values from early exposure to what then was considered morally unacceptable.
With the advent of what is now called the digital age, all that was kept behind counters or forbidden to young people by social convention is no more. The very worst kind of media that depicts explicit sexual behavior and morally reprehensible acts by any standards is readily available on phones, tablets, or computers from the very earliest ages. Children today are given tables or computers in pre-school and smart phones in grade school. All these devices are connected to an internet that is unfiltered. It attacks anyone who is unwary and invites them to a world of depravity in which the dignity of the human person, so central to our faith, is not just ignored, but savagely attacked.
There is a science fiction movie made in 1998 called Soldier. It is the story of a society in which children were selected at birth to be bought up to be soldiers. It shows their early training in which they are desensitized to killing by being forced to watch animals kill each other. It was effective; by the time they reached early adulthood they had no restrictions; they would kill anyone on command. There was a chord of truth in this sequence. Children and young adults can be desensitized to our moral code through what they watch. It informs their developing minds that what they see depicted on screens and in games is normal behavior and there is no one standing beside them to tell them it is not.
Scripture today uses the image of a vineyard which in Isaiah and the Gospel is carefully built and tended. In Isaiah, the vineyard produces worthless fruit. Clearly, if only wild grapes grew, the vines that grew there must have come from wild stock and were destroyed. The good fruit, people faithful to the Law of Moses, were not being produced in Israel. Isaiah warned them that the protections of the Lord God, who had given them the Promised Land for their safe harbor, those protections were being removed and their land would be conquered as a consequence of their unfaithfulness.
In the Gospel, greedy workers decided to take the fruit grown in the master’s vineyard for their own gain, even killing the son of the owner (a clear reference to how Jesus was taken and killed because he proclaimed the dignity of each person, that they must be loved and cared for). The Lord challenged the power of the Romans and even the Jewish leadership. For this he was killed.
And sandwiched in between we find Paul’s instructions to the Philippians telling them:
Finally, brothers and sisters,
whatever is true, whatever is honorable,
whatever is just, whatever is pure,
whatever is lovely, whatever is gracious,
if there is any excellence
and if there is anything worthy of praise,
think about these things.
No explanation is needed. In the context of the idea of the home being a safe harbor for families, adults must create an environment that encourages wholesomeness and banishes those elements that would lead toward the perversion of minds, young and old.
Nine times during the rite of baptism, parents are called upon to be the first and best teachers of their children in the practice of the faith. Practice of the faith does not mean simply to take them to church on Sunday and enroll them in religious education classes. It means to teach through example and to create a church of the home – the domestic church - in which children learn that they define themselves by their actions. They learn this because they see their parents doing the same.
Earlier we described a simpler time where threats were held back by social custom based upon Christian morality. That time is gone and the task of protecting the innocent is a thousand times more difficult. We lean on our faith in these times and must take whatever steps necessary, including censorship, to protect young minds from the destructive forces that would lead them to amorality. It is what we are called to do as disciples of the Lord who reminds us that whoever leads children into sin finds swift and deadly punishment in the life to come.
Pax
[1] Catechism links are taken from the
Homiletic Directory, published by the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments, 29 June 2014.
[2] The picture is “The Heir of the Vineyard” by James Tissot 1886-96.
[3] S.S. Commemoratio[4] The readings are taken from the New American Bible, with the exception of the psalm and its response which were developed by the International Committee for English in Liturgy (ICEL). This republication is not authorized by USCCB and is for private use only.
[5] Fire of Mercy Heart of the Word Volume III, Erasmo Leiva-Merikakis, Ignatius Press, San Francisco, CA, © 2012 p. 464
[6] Explanation: In the Catechism of the Catholic Church, “& Par.” shorthand for “and parallels.”
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