Fr Xavier Writes 8th October 2023
Here we are in the twenty-seventh Sunday ofthe year and I would like to wish all those looking forward to making pilgrimage to Rome and Assisi with our beloved Father Aaron a time filled with grace, new experience and lots of fun around. We who remain in the parish will continue to pray that their journey be one covered with God’s protection, may angels come around to guard them in all their travels and may they have a peaceful and fruitful time away from home.
As we run through the Readings of this Sunday: when parents are in deep distress after being let down or rejected by their children, they may well voice the lament of Isaiah in the First Reading: “What more could I have done for my children that I did not do?” There is no pain more intense or distressing than that of being rejected.
Rejection is something we all encounter on our journey through life and Jesus was no exception. The terrible truth is that the Son of God came to earth, showed his love in every possible way and was rejected. In this very hard-hitting gospel, we are exposed to the blunt truth that God has done everything possible for us as a people by sending his Son to live among us.
It does not take a great deal of imagination to see ourselves in this parable, each of us a tenant cultivating a small portion of God’s vineyard and, when harvest time arrives, we are expected to produce the fruits of right living. The Lord is bitterly disappointed when we lazily sit back and fail to appreciate the beauty of our lives, the joy of our families and his loving care. Are we going to offer the sour grapes of our unfaithful living to him? Christ is concerned that we respond to this appeal to bear fruit and become an immense and beautiful harvest.
Have a great week ahead and God bless.
