“FIRST IMPRESSIONS”
25th SUNDAY (A)
September 20, 2026
Isaiah 55: 6-9; Psalm 145; Philippians 1: 20c-24, 27a; Matthew 20: 1-16
by Jude Siciliano, OP
Dear Preachers:
What businessperson would not find today’s parable intolerable? What about people who work for nonprofits, or church folk – hard-working, responsible people like us? Who wouldn’t find this parable unfair?
Do we side with the workers who were hired first, those who worked all day? They were hard workers, and they grumbled. Can you blame them? “These last ones have worked only one hour, and you have made them equal to us who bore the day’s burden and the heat!”
Or, to put it more simply: “It’s not fair!”
How would you rewrite this story?
After all, we were taught to be hard workers and to expect fair pay for the work we do. Isn’t that the way we live? Isn’t that what we teach our children? Don’t hard-working students stand out in school and receive top grades? Don’t good workers receive better evaluations and promotions?
Maybe we should put our hands over our children’s ears when they hear this Gospel! Otherwise, all our lessons about fairness might go right out the window.
So, how would we rewrite the story?
The foreman is charged by the landowner to, “Summon the workers and give them their pay.” These days, we might give the foreman a calculator.
“Let’s see: a full day’s work – 100 percent pay. Nine hours – 75 percent. Three hours – 25 percent. And those who worked only one hour? Well, let’s give them 15 percent of a day’s wage. Just to be generous. After all, we are Christians, aren’t we?”
But think about those people out there waiting to be hired. Think of the day laborers who stand outside places like Home Depot, hoping that a pickup truck will arrive looking for workers. Those hired first could be proud. They were the strongest and most able-bodied. Being chosen was a lucky break. They worked hard and earned their day’s wage. They had families at home who depended on them.
So why did they grumble at the end when they saw that the last workers received the same pay? Didn’t they have any sympathy for those others who also had families depending on them? Didn’t those latecomers have the same desperate needs? And who were those hired last? The landowner asks them, “Why do you stand here idle all day?” “All day”—waiting to be chosen.
Who doesn’t get hired right away? Who is left standing at the end of the day? Perhaps the elderly, the widows, the infirm, people with disabilities, injured workers, foreigners, or others who cannot compete with the strongest and healthiest. They may not be able to work as hard or as long as others, but they still need the money. They still have mouths to feed and families depending on them.
Do we recognize ourselves in those disgruntled workers?
We Americans have hard work and competition in our bones. We have learned to measure ourselves in relation to others: Who has more? Who does more? Whose clothes are the latest fashion? Whose computer is the newest model?
Mark Twain once said, “It is not what I don’t understand about the Bible that bothers me; it’s what I do understand.”
This is an easy parable to understand – and one of the most uncomfortable to hear.
How often have we thanked God for our good fortune – for being born at this time, in this country, into our particular families; for our jobs, our homes, and the schools our children attend?
We express gratitude, but lurking behind that gratitude can be the conviction that we deserve what we have. After all, we are the all-day laborers. We have worked for it.
Mark Twain was right. Sometimes it is what we understand in the Bible that bothers us.
What kind of God emerges from this parable?
A persevering God—a God who goes out again and again, five times, and never gives up inviting people into the vineyard.
A generous God—a God whose generosity goes beyond our sense of fairness and justice.
A universal God – a God who calls everyone to work, including those whom others might consider the least capable or least deserving.
What rule of measurement does God use with us? According to this parable, God is guided by grace. Grace is a free, undeserved, unearned gift. It can seem unfair, unsettling, illogical, and completely unexpected.
But for those of us who come here week after week to hear the Scriptures, God’s ways should not come as a complete surprise. We have heard other stories in which God acts in the same way. A shepherd leaves the ninety-nine sheep in the wilderness to search for the one who is lost. A woman who has ten coins loses one, searches all day until she finds it, and then calls her friends and neighbors to celebrate. A father welcomes home a son who has squandered his inheritance in dissolute living. He embraces him, barely gives him time to apologize, and throws a party for him.
What kind of behavior is that? It doesn’t make sense – not according to ordinary human calculations.
When I lived in Raleigh, North Carolina, I visited death row. I became friends with a man named Henry. When he was younger, Henry had lived a very dissolute life. But during his later years, he began reading the Bible and praying. Cynics sometimes suspect such “prison conversions.” A couple of years before he died, Henry became Catholic.
I heard his confession on the day he was executed. So many years of his life had been wasted, unlike the lives of those who had worked faithfully and responsibly. Yet at the end of his life, Henry was offered mercy – and he seized it.
In a manner of speaking, he was one of those hired at the last hour. But he got in.
Who knows what the next life is like? Use your imagination. Jesus is there. Peter is there. Mary is there. Catherine and all the well-known saints are there. And perhaps, among them, is Henry.
How do we know? We don’t. But this parable invites us to trust in the incalculable mercy of God. It reminds us that we cannot measure God’s grace in terms of wages, merit, or our human notions of justice. God’s generosity colors every divine thought, word, and deed.
Lest we get the impression that we can simply sit back, do the minimum, and expect a generous reward at the end, the parable calls us to something more.
We were created in the image and likeness of God. Therefore, our lives should reflect that image to the world: persevering in goodness, welcoming the least, and being generous beyond measure and in unexpected ways.
That is the God who created us. That is the God who shines through these parables. And that is the God who invites us into the kingdom and says:
“Have a good look around. See how I treat the least. Observe how I act with generosity in unexpected ways. Now go and do likewise – whether you think they deserve it or not.”
Click here for a link to this Sunday’s readings: