Twenty-seventh Sunday in Ordinary Time

Today's Mass Readings

Today Jesus tells another parable. But what is a parable? Ever wondered? If you consider it, there are many in the Gospels. Some have counted over seventy. They are Jesus’ main mode of preaching. In fact, Scripture says he spoke to the crowds “only in parables.” (Mt 13:34)

I have gotten a sense of what a parable is from hearing them at Mass and reading them in the Bible, but I decided to look it up. The word “parable” is an English translation of the Greek word parabolē, which literally means “throwing alongside.” It implies a comparison of two things side by side. When Jesus tells a parable it is almost always comparing an object to the kingdom of God or telling a story about what it is like, who will be invited in, or, in the case of today’s parable, from whom it will be taken and to whom it will be given. (see Mt 21:43)

But this raises another question, what is the kingdom of God? (Matthew’s Gospel most often uses “the kingdom of heaven”, but scholars say it refers to the same spiritual reality.) Indeed, the kingdom of God is the recurrent subject of Jesus’ parables in one way or another. Truthfully, the more I dig into it, the more it seems hard to define. Perhaps that is why Jesus compares it to so many different things: wheat and weeds (Mt 13:24-30), a mustard seed (Mt 13:31-32), yeast (Mt 13:33), a treasure, a pearl, a fish net (Mt 13:44-50), not to the mention all the different stories that tell something about it.

But perhaps it is what it is on the surface: the kingdom of God is what the words mean. God has a kingdom, and God is king of it. Seems simple enough. But why, in the case of our parable today, will the kingdom of God be taken away from some and “given to a people that will produce its fruit”? (Mt 21:43) Well, simply put, because they are not giving to God what is rightfully his, the fruit!

Jesus illustrates this in a story addressed to the chief priests and the Pharisees, religious leaders of his day who were blocking the entrance into the kingdom, and who were descendants of the ones who killed the prophets. (see Mt 23:13, 31) A landowner plants a vineyard and rents it out to tenants. The tenants were supposed to pay the rent in shares of the produce. Servants are sent to collect the rent, but the tenants refuse to give it over and pay them with violence instead. The landowner is appalled (adding drama to the story here) and decides to send his son, thinking, “Surely, they will respect my son!” But in their wickedness, they think of it as an opportunity to inherit the landowner’s property, which would be given to them if they kill the heir and, apparently, upon the death of the landowner.

But the kingdom of God (read: vineyard) will not be given to the greedy and the violent, but to those who give back to God what is his.

Reflection by Br. Luke Kral, OSB