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Scripture readings<\/a> for Sept. 20, 2026, Twenty-fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time<\/p>\n Is 55:6-9\u00a0 Ps 145:2-3, 8-9, 17-18\u00a0 Phil 1:20c-24, 27a\u00a0 Mt 20:1-16a<\/p>\n Dorothy Day thought that this parable from Matthew\u2019s Gospel, which we hear this Sunday, justified a Catholic\u2019s support for the idea of a living wage. She wrote, \u201cHe spoke of the living wage, not equal pay for equal work, in the parable of those who came at the first and the eleventh hour.\u201d<\/p>\n Now aside from this specific suggestive interpretation, her general point was that, by our accounting, God is often inexplicably gracious, and further that God\u2019s graciousness should make us gracious too. And in all things, even in matters economic. Which is the fundamental truth, what Jesus Christ revealed in both word and deed, that God is a relentless giver of grace, that he is perfectly gracious. And in all things, not just in matters economic.<\/p>\n At the end of this parable in Matthew Jesus says, \u201cthe last will be first, and the first will be last\u201d (Mt 20:16). He is not talking about wages here but about Israel, the covenants, the kingdom of God, and who is welcome.<\/p>\n Jesus is saying that when it is all said and done, we are going to be surprised by who we see in the kingdom. Because it won\u2019t just be those who are conventionally good or conventionally religious or righteous; the kingdom will also include sinners and tax collectors, those with faith and the penitent, whomever they are. Even if they played the game wrong all their lives, or didn\u2019t play at all, still it\u2019s possible that they just might win in the end. For such is God\u2019s generosity.<\/p>\n And not just included, such people might even find themselves \u201cfirst\u201d in the kingdom of heaven. It\u2019s best not to be too clear what being first may precisely mean; St. Paul wrote that \u201cstar differs from star\u201d in glory, and it\u2019s probably better to leave it at that (1 Cor 15:41). But nonetheless we will likely be very surprised by who is in heaven and how it\u2019s all arranged.<\/p>\n I mean, if the \u201cIn Paradisum\u201d is anything to go by, heaven has a homeless man working the door. In heaven as it isn\u2019t on earth, that\u2019s the point. It\u2019s exactly what the self-righteous Mrs. Turpin learned at the end of Flannery O\u2019Connor\u2019s short story, \u201cRevelation.\u201d In a vision she saw the heavenly procession. At the front of it was a \u201cvast horde of souls\u2026battalions of freaks,\u201d people whom she had always looked down on and judged.<\/p>\n And only at the end of the line did she see \u201ca tribe of people whom she recognized at once as those who, like herself\u2026always had a little of everything.\u201d These latter saints at the back of line, all their lives, were used to being first; but again, in heaven as it isn\u2019t on earth. That\u2019s why O\u2019Connor ends the story telling us about their \u201cshocked and altered faces\u201d and how all their superficial virtues had to be \u201cburned away.\u201d For they had to learn just how differently God saw things.<\/p>\n Which is the spiritual and moral challenge of the parable. How differently does God see things? How differently does he see others? And if he sees others differently \u2014 say, if he loves them \u2014 then why do we hold on to our prejudices and petty hatreds? Wouldn\u2019t it be sensible, spiritually and morally speaking, to change how we see things and see other people? Wouldn\u2019t it be sensible to try to see the way God sees?<\/p>\n For that is what would truly make us gracious. And here we come back to what Dorothy Day was saying about this parable and a living wage. What she was suggesting is that sometimes one\u2019s spiritual sense should override one\u2019s economic sense, that sometimes, often in fact, one should not just be fair but gracious. For that\u2019s exactly how God is; that\u2019s exactly what he does. \u201cGraciousness is an old-fashioned word but it has a beautiful religious tradition,\u201d Day once wrote. It\u2019s to participate in divine life.<\/p>\n So, this parable invites us to look at everything differently. It invites us to see everything from God\u2019s perspective, to see everything in terms of grace and graciousness. Which is, admittedly, to see things strangely. But it\u2019s also to see a better world and maybe the beginning of heaven too.<\/p>\n<\/a><\/div>\n<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n