FOOLED BY HIS CRAZY LOVE

         We are in the Twenty-seventy Sunday of ordinary time. The readings of today, especially the first reading from Isaiah 5:1-7 and the Gospel from Mathew 21:33-43 deal with vineyard. In Isaiah, God addresses the people of Judah as his vineyard, whom He has planted, natured, pruned and cared for. In the Gospel, Jesus addresses the tenants of the vineyard who are supposed to be guardians in making sure that the vineyard yields good crops and produces good vine. In the Old Testament God realized the inability and vulnerability of the people of Israel to be productive and be faithful to the covenant. Thus, God created different institutions like kingship, priesthood, Sanhedrin and elders at different times in the history of Israel to guide the people in the ways of God and lead them to salvation.

These different institutions which are supposed to be holy, receptive and interpret the word of God fail to respond to God’s messengers. They not only turn deaf ears to the prophets and God’s messengers, furthermore they seize them and inflict evil upon them on the account of their divine message, which provokes God’s vengeance. The behaviour of the owner of the vineyard of sending his only son to the tenants to collect the dues may look foolish for us. Because, he can be very sure that if his servants have faced cruel treatment certainly his only son will not be spared. No owner on this earth will act likewise. On the other hand, Jesus in his parable specifically keeps this owner whose attitude and behaviour counters the worldly masters. It is to show that God’s ownership is not of this world. The owner in this parable is not cared about the life of his only son rather his focus is on the conversion of the wicked tenants. The unfaithful tenants should have sensed easily the vulnerability in which the owner sends his only son but they did not. They should have puzzled by this strange behaviour of the owner who sends his only son despite knowing the danger but they did not. If they were to pause, reflect and raise questions among themselves; why this owner behaves in this strange way? they would have understood that the owner is only concerned about getting his dues; he is neither interested in taking away the vineyard from them nor engrossed in giving away the vineyard to someone else. The foolish behaviour of the vineyard owner was to elicit good response from the responsible people (tenants) who are eligible to counter the shrewd things wisely. But it is a pity that the wise people messed up with this foolish thing, which is a shame.

God’s way of sending His only son to die for us on the cross cruelly is foolishness for us. But the pity is that we are not able to respond even to this foolishness in spite God given wisdom and understanding. This foolishness shows that God is interested in giving mercy and compassion. Yes, He is a fool who pardons our sins and forgives our trespasses despite our constant astray. He did not captivate us with wise thoughts and hard demands. He captivated and redeemed us with His foolishness. Hah hah ha! Yes, we are fooled by His strange behaviour. We, the vineyard and the tenants are fooled by our immature wisdom and understanding. At last we, the creatures are fooled by His crazy love upon us - the irresponsible people.

We can overcome this immaturity by placing Jesus as the centre of our life. He is the corner stone (Mt 21:42). The building of our life collapses if we remove this corner stone. Let us put Jesus in all that we do. St. Francis of Assisi, whose feast we keep today fooled this world by his simplicity in life. The foolishness of God redeemed the world. The foolishness of St. Francis of Assisi reformed the church. Thus, it is foolishness which changes and mends the world. Let us be attentive to the foolishness of God and the saints with the help of Jesus our cornerstone to be mature in our God given wisdom and understanding.