Homily for the Twenty-Seventh Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year A

Diligent Builder And His Unproductive Vineyard

Rev. Marcel Divine Emeka Okwara, CSsR

Homily for the Twenty-Seventh Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year A

St. Alphonsus Catholic Church, Brooklyn Center, MN

Sunday, October 8, 2023

Today’s first reading taken from prophet Isaiah (5:1-7) begins in an unusual way. Instead of “Thus says the Lord,” Isaiah begins with “Let me now sing of my friend.” Isaiah does not shout or scream or scold. He does not mumble or meander. Isaiah sings. He tells the story of his friend. His friend has planted a vineyard on a rich and productive hillside. After that, he tills the land thoroughly. He clears the land of stones. If you have done this kind of work of clearing the land of stones, you know how difficult and back-breaking and time consuming it can be. After that, Isaiah’s friend plants “the choicest vines,” that is, the very best vines he can find. After that, he built a watchtower and hewed out a wine press. What’s the watchtower for? It is used to guard this precious vineyard against vicious invaders. As for the wine press, it is built in anticipation of a great harvest of grapes. Finally we are told that he built a wall around the vineyard to further protect it from marauders and animals etc. 

Who is Isaiah’s friend? Who is the owner of the vineyard? The Lord God of Israel! Who is the vineyard? The people of Israel! What’s the point of the love song? Prophet Isaiah is showing us the extent the God of Israel has gone to build his people. The cultivation of the land, the clearing of the land, the removal of stones, the building of a watchtower and a protective wall etc speak about a thousand different ways that the God of Israel has cultivated and formed his people. It is about all the ways the Lord has shared his heart with Israel. Think about the great act of liberation by which God brought out Israel from the slavery land in Egypt. This is all the ways that God has prepared this beautiful vineyard. But despite all the great effort made, God is disappointed and frustrated. Why? At harvest time, when he comes looking for crop of grapes, what he found “was wild grapes. Despite all his efforts, what he found at harvest time was stinking grapes. Up and down the prophetic literature, we hear that God gave his whole heart to his people, but his people has not responded in kind. They know the law, they received the covenant, they have the temple, they have the prophets, they have the benefit of escaping from the slavery land, Egypt, yet, they have not responded to God’s overtures. 

Now, don’t think that this story, Isaiah’s love song, is only about ancient Israel. It is also about us. St. Paul refers to the Church as the new Israel. We are the new Israel. We are now the chosen race. From the lips of John we hear, “He came to his own people, but his own people did not accept him. But to those who did accept him he gave power to become children of God…” (John 1:11-12). In Catholic terms, everything is grace. God lavishes his grace and love upon us, and we are meant to cooperate with that grace. God’s grace does not guarantee that the harvest will be great and fruitful unless we cooperate, unless we respond to it. Look at our own lives. Hasn’t God lavished his grace upon us? Of course he has. Like ancient Israel, God has also done for us a great act of liberation from the slavery land. God gives us his Son, Jesus Christ. His victory on the cross is our victory too. He wins for us. He liberates us from the shackle of the Devil. He even says, “Whoever has been set free by the Son of Man is free indeed” (John 8:36). Add to it, he gives us the sacraments, the Church, the Bible, the communion of the saints etc. We also have the angels, our Guardian Angels who are protecting and guiding us to the kingdom of God. These are the different ways that God is cultivating us, his children. Think of the sacraments again, especially the Mass, the Eucharist. How many of our brothers and sisters in faith are staying away from it today? A lot! The attitude today is, “I don’t need to go to church to pray to God.” Think about the sacrament of confession. How many churchgoing Catholics are staying away from it? A lot! The attitude today is, “I can confess my sins in my house and that’s enough.” Think about many Catholics who are cohabiting and having children without the sacrament of marriage. But they will bring their children to church for baptism. Why? Because they believe that the sacrament of baptism is good for their kids. Strangely, such couples dither when you encourage them to sacramentalize their marriage. They just don’t get it that in spiritual life, what is good for the goose is also good for the gander. 

Truth be told! God has cultivated his vineyard and will continue to cultivate it till the end of the world. And he is cultivating it through various means and ways. But will the people of the world respond? Will the attitude of “I am okay, and you are okay” allow us to yield to God’s grace? Will the secular philosophy of  self-affirmation “I am beautiful in every single way” allow us to cooperate with God’s grace? When God returns at harvest time, will he find good and sweet grapes or wild and stinking grapes? The stubborn refusal to surrender to grace, the prideful attitude of ignoring the sacraments, the delusional mindset of believing, relying and depending on oneself is the reason why Jesus, in our Gospel for today (Matthew 21:33-43) says to the chief priests and the elders of the people, “I say to you, the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people that will produce its fruit.” I tell you, the first most important fruit is humility. Humility is from the Latin “humus,” (soil)“humilitas,” that is, close to the ground, the earth. A humble person is so close to the ground, close to reality. In the spiritual order, reality is finally knowing the stubborn fact— that no one can pay his or her own ransom. That we all need God, we need the Church, we need the sacraments and all the various ways and means that God is sharing his heart with us. No matter how great, how wealthy, how talented, smart, beautiful, wonderful and amazing we may be, we ultimately need God to be saved. 

God bless you!