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Sunday Reflection with Fr Robin Gibbons - 5 October 2014


Cologne, frater Nycolaus (scribe); 1450  National Library of the Netherlands

Cologne, frater Nycolaus (scribe); 1450 National Library of the Netherlands

How often do you see something without really recognising what it is? I do that all the time, in fact sometimes when I am very distracted by things on my mind, I can completely ignore people I know well, pass them by in my own ’cloud of unknowing’, usually to have them stop me and say :’ You’ve got your head in the clouds, didn’t you see me calling to you?’ I’ve seen people but my self-absorption means I haven’t really perceived my friends!

There’s a hint of that in Matthew’s parable of the Vineyard and the tenants who kill the landowner's son. Their focus is on their own wants and needs, on their hard work and the harvest about to come, but, and it’s a big but, they forget that they are the Stewards, not the proprietor! They see the servants and son of the landowner, but do not perceive who they really are, they do not value them at all.

Does this mean anything for us? Of course it does! Jesus refers to the vineyard as the Kingdom of God, so we can see ourselves as his stewards. Through this parable Jesus is challenging us, asking the question, what are YOU doing for the Kingdom in YOUR daily life? Are we good stewards? Does our faith really matter to us or like those selfish tenants, do we pay a kind of lip service to it, forgetting that the Lord’s vineyard, where we are called to work, is the actual setting of our everyday life?

Jesus is asking us to look beyond our own immediate needs, to be less selfish and reach out to the deeper call of God found in the great commandment to love God, and our neighbour as oneself. It isn’t easy because there are so many distracting claims on us, and sin, always part of our lives, makes us selfish!

Yet the point Jesus makes is clear, our faith has to be the cornerstone of life, not an added extra.

That’s exciting, for the Lord’s vineyard is a place of growth, encounter and development. Paul tells us not to worry, if our prayers and petitions are shot through with gratitude, God’s peace in Christ will be with us. As part of good stewardship let’s pray for the Synod on the Family, meeting in Rome and always for our sisters and brothers persecuted in the Middle East.

Fr Robin Gibbons is an Eastern Rite Chaplain for the Melkite Greek Catholics in Britain.

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