25th Sunday, Come Late Receive Same Reward

 

“You too go into my vineyard”.

Jesus told this parable to help us better understand how generous and merciful God is. And it helps to understand how God’s chosen people, who were faithful through the centuries before Christ, have no reason to complain about the Gentiles (non-Jews), who are now able to receive the same reward, the gift of being a Christian, a follower of Christ, a worker in His vineyard and the gift of eternal life.

The Gentiles are those paid for only one hour of work, while the Jews are those who worked all day to obtain the same reward. The Jews have nothing to complain about because they receive what has was promised to them.

But the seeming unfairness of the landowner’s decision can still leave us feeling a bit unsettled. We might react differently, however, when we consider the lives of two people who, like the workers in this parable, came to the vineyard later in life.

Felix Leseur was raised Catholic in 19^th century France, but lost his faith in medical school and became an atheist. His wife, Elisabeth, on the other hand, grew closer to God and began praying fervently for her husband’s conversion. After her death at the age of 47, Felix began reading her diary. The deep faith he saw in the diary touched him, and he returned to the Lord at the age of 56 and eventually became a Dominican priest. In her diary, she explained how she offered all her pain and suffering for her husband, so that he could become her faith. She had the most remarkable results. Her strength was in her pain. Her greatest suffering was her loneliness, because her husband was not sharing her faith. She was tempted to think, she married the wrong person. She became an invalid for 10 years.

However, she believed God would and could change her husband’s heart, even if she wouldn’t see it in her life. Dr. Leseur, the atheist, dismissed her faith as the fancies of a pious woman.

He went to Lourdes to write a book against the Virgin Mary. However, as he looked up into the face of the statue of Mary, he received the great gift of faith. His conversion was total and complete. He saw it all. At once. Father Leseur would someday be a powerful preacher and give a retreat to Bishop Fulton Sheen.

St. Angela of Floligno was born in 1248 to a wealthy family in Umbria, Italy. Married at a young age, she reveled in the wordly life and all its trappings. But a series of natural disasters and ongoing war led her to reexamine her priorities. At the age of 37 she sought the Lord’s mercy in Confession. Then after the premature deaths of her husband, mother, and two children, she gave up all her possessions and became a lay Franciscan. She entered the Lord’s vineyard as religious, who took vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience.

These examples show us that God’s mercy can touch the hearts of a most anti-Catholic person and a very worldly woman, even after they lived most of their life before their conversion.

As a priest, I baptized a 97 year old unconscious woman, who died within an hour after she was baptized. She always wanted to be baptized, and she received her gift, even though she didn’t know it, until she went to her judgment. All of her sins and the punishment due to her sins were washed away. So when she died, she went straight to heaven. No purgatory time.

This seems unfair if someone was baptized as an infant, and lived their whole life trying to be overcome sin, and they end up in purgatory. The older lady, never had to confess her sins, never attended Mass regularly, and never received Holy Communion. Yet, she went straight to heaven. Does that seem fair?

Once, I baptize an 85 year old man, Confirmed him, gave him his first Holy Communion, and for the rest of his life he was a practicing Catholic. He became a worker in the Lord’s vineyard by his daily living out of his Catholic faith.

Over the years, I heard Confessions of people, who hadn’t been to Confession for 50 years or longer. Yet, God in His mercy forgave them.

Before I thought about becoming a priest, when I was a young, I never went to Confession for 20 years. But after I started practicing my faith, I realized God was calling me, then I became a priest at the age of 40. I was like one who only worked an hour, but God the full pay being a worker in His vineyard. Though undeserving, I pray, God in His mercy will give me the whole enchilada when I die.

Even if someone converts in their later years, God can still make them a saint because His mercy is infinite.

Is there anyone in your family, you have given up on, thinking that they will never come to know and love God?

When we hear about people like Felix and Angela, we don’t begrudge them the heavenly reward they are now enjoying. We don’t begrudge the people who lived many years of a sinful life, but they had a conversion and were able to enter God’s kingdom. They were able to be workers in His vineyard before God called them home to heaven.

It doesn’t matter that they came later to the vineyard. God and his angels in heaven still rejoiced, and so should we-- anytime we hear of someone turning to God later in life.

God is always inviting people to “go into my vineyard”.

Today at Mass, pray for those you know, who have not yet accepted his invitation to become a close follower of Jesus. May they one day receive the reward he so graciously has in store for them! “Father, we praise you for your mercy and generosity, which have no bounds!”