A Homily for the Twenty-fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time

Readings: Isaiah 55:6-9  Philippians 1:20c-24, 27a  Matthew 20:1-16a

Two plus two? 22! Four plus four plus four? 444! 

Over the years, I have eaten a lot of lunches with students. Second graders are good conversationalists, though their topics tend to run in grooves. If one second grader visited her grandparents or got a new dog, they all did. 

And when topics run short, the students like to quiz me on their newly acquired abilities in mathematics. “What’s nine minus five?”

I think, why not keep it interesting? I enjoy watching them reconcile their skills with the sheer simplicity of my approach. “What is three plus three?” 

Thirty-three makes as much sense as six. 

The kids pile on the additions and subtractions, watching the new system at work. Then they try to stump me. They ask, what is five minus five?

Easy, I say. “Blue.”

“Blue! Blue!” They screech. 

“Wait a minute. Let me think. It might be green.”

The Gospel has nothing to do with math. We know that, but do we truly believe it? After all, we understand how our world works, how things add up or fail to do so. You want something? You must earn it, pay for it. You did not get what you expected? Better pay more. 

Christ undermines the entire system of exchange when he tells us that those who are hired last receive the same pay as those recruited first.

We calculate. Christ does not. Easy to preach, but almost impossible to believe, at least if we are honest with ourselves. 

It makes sense on Sunday mornings, when we presume that we are those who have been faithful throughout the day. We congratulate ourselves on being generous towards those who might come after us. After all, we are not the ones paying.

But the parable’s purpose runs deeper than comparison. Christ completely rejects calculation, and that truly confounds us. Here’s why.

The most primal effect of original sin is our own self-image. The Fall first enters the human heart and spreads from there throughout all of creation. We become convinced that we are not truly lovable, that others, if they truly knew us, would equally disparage us. As soon as we can calculate—and that comes before schooling—we work all our lives to make ourselves lovable, to earn our keep.

We are born to calculate. When things go our way, we enjoy the satisfaction of those who have made their payments on time. When things go wrong, even before we question God’s goodness, we immediately sense that we have been found out, that we are being paid what we deserve.

Small wonder that we envy, hate and deceive each other. The world tells us that love is hard-won and in short supply. We lack the grace to believe the Gospel, the proclamation that we come from love, live in love and will soon enough come to the fullness of love. This is the cipher of the cross: that God put an end to calculation when Christ died upon it. 

Like the other saints, Paul seems to have stepped, or rather been lifted, out of calculation. 

For to me life is Christ, and death is gain (Phil 1:21).

Paul already lives in abundance. He will pass into more.

How do we get knocked off the same horse? How do we forget the nightmarish math we have learned? 

We must sit in prayerful silence. We must read the Scripture that tells us that we are loved, and then we must pray for the inestimable grace to believe.

The Rev. Terrance W. Klein is a priest of the Diocese of Dodge City and author of Vanity Faith.