Bishop Varden asks whether Christians rejoice in God's goodness to others

Bishop Erik Varden has proposed an examination of conscience based on the parable of the workers in the vineyard: can we be glad when God freely gives others what we believe we have worked years to earn?

The bishop of Trondheim, Norway, preached on the question at Mass on September 20, the 25th Sunday in Ordinary Time, during which Fr. Florian Pletscher was installed as pastor of the cathedral. Drawing on the Gospel of St. Matthew, Varden focused on the attitude of those who started work first thing in the morning and ended up aggrieved when they saw the last arrivals paid the same.

"It is never too late" to come to the vineyard

Varden began with one detail of the parable. The owner went out several times to look for workers and even hired some when the day was almost over. To understand the scene, the bishop asked his hearers not to imagine the market of a large modern city but a small town in ancient Palestine.

In a place with only a few hundred inhabitants, he said, the owner could hardly have gone all day without noticing a group of men who had been waiting for work since sunrise. Varden said those hired at the end had probably arrived later, or had only started looking for work as the day drew to a close.

That is where he found a first lesson about the owner's attitude. Varden pointed to his "gentle generosity": he did not rebuke or humiliate the latecomers, and he did not begin by questioning them about their motives.

Instead he offered them an opportunity. He trusted that they could still be useful, and that the experience of working in the vineyard could change them.

The vineyard stands for the kingdom of heaven, Varden said, and in it "there is room for all kinds of people." Entering requires getting involved and working. "This is not a cruise with free drinks," he said. But the door stays open.

"It is never too late to arrive."

There will always be something for each person to do, the bishop said, whatever their abilities or physical condition. He added a key for reading the parable: "Working in the vineyard is itself a reward." That is where the Christian learns beatitude, he said.

The problem was not receiving little, but that others received too much

Those who had started work first had lost sight of that. When the day ended and they saw the owner give the same pay to everyone, whether they had worked one hour or ten, they began to complain.

No agreement had been broken, Varden said. A wage of one denarius had been set before the day began, and that is exactly what they received.

The root of their anger lay elsewhere:

"What provokes the first is not that they receive too little, but that the others receive too much."

The bishop linked their grumbling to an attitude that Scripture condemns repeatedly, because it can turn into rebellion against God's goodness. From there he applied the parable directly to Christian life.

"Do I rejoice in God's goodness to others?"

Varden then posed a first question for self-examination. What happens when someone else freely and quickly receives a grace that we think we needed years to "deserve"?

"Do I rejoice in God's goodness to others, or do I grow bitter when they easily receive benefits I have worked hard for?"

Such moments, he said, are a chance to see how far a Christian has really accepted a life founded on grace. Against that he set the image of Matthew before he became an apostle: shut away as a tax collector, counting small coins.

The parable thus raises an uncomfortable question. It asks not only whether we accept God's generosity when it comes to us, but whether we can celebrate it when someone else benefits, even when we judge that the person came late or did less.

The joy of being called to work

Varden added a second question. Rather than seeing service to God as a burden whose effort should bring a larger reward, he invited his hearers to ask whether they are aware of the privilege of having been called.

"Do I rejoice that I am allowed to serve in God's vineyard, that I am called to build up his Church?"

He recalled a hymn by Lars Oftedal that expresses this attitude in a simple act of thanksgiving: "What joy to be yours! Thank you for letting me take part!"

Seen this way, the years given to Christian life stop being an account to present to God. Having been able to stay longer in the vineyard is already a gift.

"To grow in Christian maturity is to become ever more grateful"

Varden tied this understanding of Christian life to a grateful memory of the moments when each person has answered God's call.

He encouraged the faithful to remember the anniversaries of their baptism and confirmation, married couples to mark their wedding anniversary, and priests and religious to remember the days of their ordination and their vows.

"To grow in Christian maturity is to become ever more grateful, to live ever more eucharistically."

Being aware of those stages, he said, allows a person to remember at once the gift received from God and the answer he has given through his own promises. The more this attitude grows, he added, the greater the capacity to rejoice "for every moment spent in the vineyard."

"After all," he said, "we have tasted the new wine that gladdens the heart of man."

The priest and the bishop are "conduits and stewards"

The image of the vineyard took on a concrete meaning in the liturgy. At the Mass, Varden installed Fr. Florian Pletscher as pastor of Trondheim cathedral, after he had served for a time as administrator.

The bishop said the priest would not necessarily begin doing work different from what he was already doing. What changed was the responsibility he was taking on explicitly for that "vineyard."

Over about a year and a half, Varden said, the new pastor had come to know the ground, found where it was necessary to "water and weed," learned to use the machinery and got to know his co-workers. Now he had answered: "Yes! I want to serve in this place."

After the oath of fidelity, Varden said he would lead him to some of the cathedral's central places: the baptismal font, the confessional and the tabernacle. Each of them, he said, shows a particular aspect of the goodness God offers to those willing to receive it and respond to it.

He recalled where the minister ultimately stands in relation to that grace:

"The priest, and the bishop too, is simply a conduit and steward of that goodness."

Varden closed by returning to the question that ran through the homily: how we react when God's generosity does not necessarily match our calculations.

"May God's generosity not provoke envy in us."

He asked that every Christian be able to discover the strength that comes from cooperating with that grace according to his own calling, and ended with a wish for the community in Trondheim: "May the vineyard of St. Olaf in this place bear fruit a hundredfold!"