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The Light of the World
“The kingdom of heaven is like to an householder who went out early in the morning to hire
laborers into his vineyard” (Gospel). He begins his search for laborers early in the day and visits
the market place again at the third, the sixth, the ninth, and the eleventh hour. At each visit
he finds unemployed laborers idling in the market place, unconcerned about the work in the
vineyard of souls. So, too, the Lord approaches us with the question, “Why stand you here all
the day idle? . . . Go you also into My vineyard.” We have as yet done very little for the salvation
of our own souls or for those of others. We must now take up the task earnestly and zealously.
The Lord has given us the call: “Go you also into My vineyard,” work for the salvation of souls.
Today at this very hour the invitation is given to us. For us it is not yet too late; it is never too
late for any soul that is willing to turn from its evil ways and make an earnest effort. It is too
late only for those who abandon the struggle. “Why stand you here all the day idle?” God calls
us today to bear patiently the heat and the burden of the day in His vineyard; He invites us to
strive in the arena of the world for the incorruptible crown of eternal life. We must struggle
valiantly for the crown of victory.
The liturgy places St. Lawrence before us as a model for our conduct during Lent. While
suffering on his bed of fire at the time of his martyrdom, he cried out: “The sorrows of death
surrounded me, the sorrows of hell encompassed me; and in my affliction I called upon the
Lord, and He heard my voice from His holy temple” (Introit). A second model is given us in
the Epistle in the person of St. Paul, the valiant champion of the Church: “Brethren, know you
not that they that run in the race, all run indeed, but one receiveth the prize? So run that you
may obtain. And every one that striveth for the mastery refraineth himself from all things; and
they indeed that they may receive a corruptible crown, but we an incorruptible one. I therefore
so run, not as at an uncertainty; I so fight, not as one beating the air; but I chastise my body and
bring it into subjection, lest perhaps when I have preached to others, I myself should become
a castaway” (Epistle).
The chosen people, the Israelites, provide a third example of the preparation we should
make for Easter. The thought of our baptism and of the Holy Eucharist dominates the Easter
cycle, which we are now beginning. But the liturgy warns us to remember that the chosen people,
too, had a baptism and a Eucharist. They “were all under the cloud, and all passed through
the sea, and all in Moses were baptized, in the cloud and in the sea; and did all eat the same
spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink (and they drank of the spiritual rock that
followed them; and the rock was Christ). But with most of them God was not well pleased”
(Epistle). Only a small remnant of the chosen people reached the Holy Land. The majority of
them were unfaithful to God in spite of their baptism and the heavenly manna. Woe be to us
if we should prove unworthy of our baptism and of the Holy Eucharist. Even the most holy
things can be misused.
“Every one that striveth for the mastery refraineth himself from all things.” That should also be
our program at the beginning of Lent. Why must we give up everything? That Christ the conqueror
may conquer again in us and have the honor that is His due. We must reject everything
and purify ourselves, so that nothing may hamper Christ’s work in us. We die, and yet we live.
We must die to all sin and to all willful imperfections. We must abandon all desires and thoughts
that are not in conformity with God’s holy will. We must die to our own will in order that the
will and the spirit of Christ may dominate us completely. This is what the holy season of Lent
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