Twenty-third Annual Interfaith Memorial Service for the Victims of Abortion - Holy Trinity Greek Orthodox Church
- January 22, 2010
When Jesus first taught this parable about the vineyard and the tenant farmers, everyone who heard it knew what he meant by it. That was part of the problem. His audience especially knew whom Jesus meant by it. Luke tells us that the Scribes and Pharisees “knew it was aimed at them.” Indeed it was.
The vineyard is Israel. God is the owner who planted it. The tenant farmers to whom the owner leases the vineyard are the rulers in Israel, such as kings and priests. The servants the owner sends to collect his share of the harvest are the prophets, who are beaten and insulted for their trouble. Jesus is the Son that God sends to Israel, the Son they kill. The warning at the end is that God will turn the inheritance of his chosen people and the holy land over to others.
Some of the lessons of this teaching are evident right away: the pride and selfishness of the tenant farmers, who did not create or plant the vineyard, yet began to act as if they are the owners; their betrayal of the owner, who trusted them; their failure to give the owner his due; their behaving as if they have exclusive control, even though they have no right to do so; finally, the prediction of final accountability, of sooner or later having to give an account of their actions.
Other lessons concern God himself: his patience, in giving the people many chances, but also his eventually judging justly. Still other lessons concern Jesus, the Son: he claims to be God’s Son; he knows what is coming—his death; he does not doubt God’s ultimate triumph.
Is there a special meaning in this parable for us here gathered for the 23rd Annual Interfaith Memorial Service for the Victims of Abortion, in defense of the Sanctity of Human Life? I believe there is, and the key to the meaning is to substitute for “vineyard” the “gift of human life.” We did not create human life, God did. We have been entrusted with this precious gift and we are meant to share it and protect it according to the will of its Creator.
As in the story of the tenant farmers and the vineyard, the sins of pride and selfishness have led us to behave as if we are the absolute masters of human life, as if we have no accountability to anyone beyond ourselves, as if we have the right to do violence to human life when it suits our purposes. Nevertheless, God still sends his servants, the prophets among us, to call us back to respect for, to accountability for, the precious gift of human life. We are called to witness to the truth about the gift of human life, and to stand together with the modern prophets as they speak truth to the powers of this world. We give this witness when we oppose abortion and assisted suicide, as well as the laws, organizations and individuals who promote them.
However, as we witness to the precious value of human life, we may not resort to the tactics of those who oppose us. In this parable of Jesus, the servants who represent the owner of the vineyard suffer the violence of the farmers, but we are not told that they responded in kind. In our time, many do violate human life violently, but we are not therefore entitled to speak or act with violence. Nor may we become self-righteous, judging ourselves to be better, holier, more virtuous, or more pleasing to God than others are. Indeed, we are not to judge ourselves or them—period. As St. Paul teaches, we leave the judging of persons to God. Serving the truth does not exempt us from serving humbly.
The Scribes and the Pharisees were furious that Jesus had aimed the parable of the vineyard at them. They decided to try to trap Jesus in his speech. The trap was this: ask Jesus whether it was lawful to pay tribute (tax) to Caesar, the Roman emperor. If he said “no,” then they could report it to the Roman army of occupation, which would arrest him. If Jesus said “yes,” one could pay the tax, then he would lose the favor and the admiration of the crowd, among whom the tax was very unpopular.
In reply to their question, Jesus asked the Pharisees to show him the coin of tribute, and then asked them whose image and inscription were on it. They responded, “Caesar’s.” He replied, “Then render to Caesar what is Caesar’s, and to God what is God’s.” It’s a clever and a true answer: whoever has the authority to mint and issue the money has the authority to demand it back again in taxation.
In this Gospel passage is Jesus teaching that there is an absolute wall of separation between Church and State? There are those among us who believe so, and they try to divide off religious faith, expression and experience from everything else that would automatically come under the heading, “Caesar’s.” But stop and think for a moment: Jesus tells us to render to God what is God’s. What exists that is not ultimately God’s? Did our current human versions of Caesar actually create the forests, the oceans, and the polar icecaps? Do civil officeholders actually sustain Creation in existence? For the believer, isn’t Caesar—the political authority—merely a steward, working alongside the other stewards of Creation? Not the Creator, but the steward; not the owner, but the tenant farmer.
True, each believer ought to be a good, active, participating citizen in the life of the society in which she or he lives. But for the believer, God has the last word, not the state. There is a domain in which Caesar’s writ does not run—the domain of the human conscience. Our country has a long and honorable tradition of religious leaders and people who challenged Caesar courageously and justly, as a matter of conscience. Think of the American religious leaders in the nineteenth century who challenged the legal institution of slavery and disobeyed the laws that required them to return runaway slaves to their masters. Think of the Protestant, Catholic and Jewish leaders only fifty years ago who challenged the legal barriers against civil rights for people of all races.
As a Christian I proudly acknowledge that I am a citizen of this country, that I vote and pay taxes in a republic, but I also need to say that in my heart of hearts I am also a monarchist—my ultimate loyalty is to a king and to his kingdom, to a king whose throne was a Cross and whose crown was fashioned from thorns.
So, as citizens, we are called to a difficult and complex role: to be the servant and the conscience of the State, of the civil society in which we live. St. Thomas More was called to be the servant and the conscience of his king, Henry VIII, who put him to death for speaking truth to power. On the scaffold, just before he died, More said to the bystanders, “I die the King’s good servant, but God’s first.” We walk tomorrow in witness to the unique, precious sanctity of each human life, in the womb, in our families, on our streets, in our hospitals and hospices. God, the Lord of the Vineyard, is the Lord of all life, and our God calls us to pray and work and witness in defense of that gift of life. Tomorrow we walk together in response to that call.
Luke 20:9-26
