Daily Gospel Reflection – Thursday of the Twentieth Week in Ordinary Time

Daily Gospel Reflection – Thursday of the Twentieth Week in Ordinary Time

Daily Gospel Reflection – Thursday of the Twentieth Week in Ordinary Time 

August 19, 2021 

Thursday of the Twentieth Week in Ordinary Time 

Gospel: Mt 20:1-16a

Jesus again in reply spoke to the chief priests and the elders of the people in parables saying, “The Kingdom of heaven may be likened to a king who gave a wedding feast for his son. He dispatched his servants to summon the invited guests to the feast, but they refused to come. A second time he sent other servants, saying, ‘Tell those invited: “Behold, I have prepared my banquet, my calves and fattened cattle are killed, and everything is ready; come to the feast.”’ Some ignored the invitation and went away, one to his farm, another to his business. The rest laid hold of his servants, mistreated them, and killed them. The king was enraged and sent his troops, destroyed those murderers, and burned their city. Then the king said to his servants, ‘The feast is ready, but those who were invited were not worthy to come. Go out, therefore, into the main roads and invite to the feast whomever you find.’ The servants went out into the streets and gathered all they found, bad and good alike, and the hall was filled with guests. But when the king came in to meet the guests he saw a man there not dressed in a wedding garment. He said to him, ‘My friend, how is it that you came in here without a wedding garment?’ But he was reduced to silence. Then the king said to his attendants, ‘Bind his hands and feet, and cast him into the darkness outside, where there will be wailing and grinding of teeth.’ Many are invited, but few are chosen.” 

Source: United States Conference of Catholic Bishops 

Bishop Robert Barron 

Friends, in today’s Gospel, Jesus tells the parable of the landowner who hires people at various times of the day and then pays everyone the same. Now consider the fact that these workers represent us and the landowner God. From our perspective, there is plenty of injustice, plenty of inexplicable inequity, plenty of infuriating unfairness. 

But God knows everything about everything. Our knowledge is comparatively minuscule in both depth and breadth. What we can see of God’s canvas is laughably small. And yet we make bold to declare certain things just or unjust. 

Recall the story of the gangster who called for a priest as he lay dying on the street in New York. The priest declared him forgiven, and there was a flood of protest: How could this be fair to all of those who had been good and devout Christians all of their lives? 

My ways are not your ways, says the Lord. Let us have the humility to allow God to distribute his graces as he sees fit. And let us not ask “why” in a spirit of rebellion, but “why” in a spirit of awe and expectation.