A reading from the Holy Gospel according to Matthew.

Jesus said to the disciples, “The kindom of God is like the owner of an estate who went out at dawn to hire workers for the vineyard. After reaching an agreement with them for the usual daily wage, the owner sent them out to the vineyard.  About mid-morning, the owner came out and saw others standing around the marketplace without work, and said to them, ‘You go along to my vineyard and I will pay you whatever is fair.’  At that, they went away.  Around noon and again in the mid-afternoon the owner came out and did the same.  Finally, going out late in the afternoon, the owner found still others standing around, and said to these, ‘Why have you been

standing here idle all day?’ ‘No one has hired us,’ they replied, to which the owner said, ‘You go to my vineyard, too.’

“When evening came, the owner said to the overseer, ‘Call the workers and give them their pay, but begin with the last group and end with the first.’  When those hired late in the afternoon

came up they received a full day’s pay; and when the first group appeared they assumed they would get more.  Yet they received the same daily wage.  Thereupon, they complained to the owner, ‘This last group did only an hour’s work, but you have put them on the same basis as those who have worked a full day in the scorching heat.’  ‘My friend,’ said the owner to those who voiced this, ‘1 do you no injustice.  You agreed on the usual wage, did you not?  Take your

pay and go home.  I intend to give this worker who was hired last the same pay as you.  I am free to do as I please with my money, am I not?  Or are you envious because I am generous?’ Thus, the last will be first and the first will be last.”

The Good News as spoken through Matthew.