AT THE CROSSROADS Twenty-Seventh Sunday in Ordinary Time Commentary on Matt 21:33-43: God reveals himself and his will in concrete human history. He acts in the world using the materiality of the world and the physicality of human existence. He chose Israel as his privileged favorite people for the initial stage of his self-revelation. Thus, the Song of the Vineyard in Is 5:1-7 is used in this way. The vineyard is Israel and God is its landowner. God at first cultivated the vineyard, preparing this for his heir: Jesus Christ. Then he entrusted this cultivated vineyard to his tenants: the religious leaders of Israel who were entrusted to continue the productive activity in the vineyard so that it would yield much fruit. By leaving the vineyard, God gave these religious authorities semi-autonomy and responsibility to nourish the faith of the people. They were to keep the spiritual fertility of the people active and productive. But Israel did not follow his ways. For when vintage time came, God sent his prophets to collect the spiritual products of Israel’s care for her people. But alas, the leading citizens of Israel arrested the prophets, tortured them and killed them! Finally, God sent his only son and heir, Jesus. But the chief priests and scribes and the leading men of the city of Jerusalem did to Jesus that which was done to the prophets of old. They thought that by killing the son and heir, they were freed from him and free now to occupy the vineyard, the land. But ironically, it was God who freed the land from pseudo-leaders by the death of his Son and only heir. Now the heir, by his death, has complete claim over the land, and the land is now completely free! Indeed, the responsibility of Kingdom-building is now handed over to the poor and the victim, to those who believe, to those who accept Jesus, God’s only Son and sole heir of the Kingdom. The Old Testament trajectory is realized in the New: the mission of Israel, the mission of the Son is to share this religious experience with all nations so that they may believe in God and obey his will. This universal mission has now a particular character: it is now addressed not so much to the leaders but to the victims of their own power and authority: the poor, the violated. They – the poor, the violated, the victims of injustice and exploitation – are now the inheritors of the kingdom of the Son, the sole heir. The ruling elite have no more real power and authority over the poor and the oppressed, except by coercion and violence. The latter are now free. As the new people of God and citizens of his Kingdom, they can opt to live outside or even against the social controls determined by bourgeois boundaries that only serve the few and enslave the majority. Thus, the early Christian community and our Church in the modern world are united in the life and mission of the Son: to proclaim the Reign of God, “not so much by dogmatic orthodoxy but by the praxis of liberation of the poor and the disinherited of this world” (Luis Alonso-Schoekel, La biblia de nuestro pueblo). The Catechism of the Catholic Church says: (543-544) “Everyone is called to enter the kingdom… The kingdom belongs to the poor and the lowly … Jesus identifies himself with the poor of every kind and makes active love toward them the condition for entering his kingdom.” Friends: Jesus is inviting us now to lead a new life. Propositions, sentences and formulas on who God is and what love is all about do not save us. Rather, we are saved by Jesus, the active lover and servant of humanity. So we go to him, as he comes to us, by loving and serving him in the poor and the little ones… to whom the kingdom belongs. Can we do just that? – Fr. Ben (Visit cfamedia.org and YouTube, Gospel Break with Fr. Ben)
Posted on: Sat, 04 Oct 2014 22:00:01 +0000
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