27th Sunday in Ordinary Time: Homily for October 4, 2026
Lectionary Year A · Ordinary Time
Readings: Isaiah 5:1–7 | Psalm 80:9, 12, 13–14, 15–16, 19–20 | Philippians 4:6–9 | Matthew 21:33–43
Also today: the memorial of St. Francis of Assisi, and Respect Life Sunday in many US parishes, which opens Respect Life Month.
Whose Vineyard Is It? The Gospel of Fruit
Good morning, brothers and sisters. Today’s readings begin with a love song and end with a murder.
Isaiah sings for his friend a song about his beloved’s vineyard. It sits on a fertile hillside. The owner digs it, clears the stones, plants the choicest vines, builds a watchtower, and hews out a wine press. He does everything a lover could do, and then he waits. And the vineyard yields wild grapes.
Seven centuries later Jesus tells the same story to the chief priests and elders in the Temple, days before his Passion. This time the vineyard is fine, and the trouble is with the tenants. The owner sends servants to collect the harvest. They beat one, kill another, and stone a third. Finally he sends his son, thinking, “They will respect my son.” They seize him, throw him out of the vineyard, and kill him.
The question underneath both stories is a searching one: what did God get for everything he gave?
The Song of the Vineyard
First Reading: Isaiah 5:1–7
Isaiah is a good preacher. He begins with a ballad, and his listeners lean in. Then, halfway through, the singer turns the song on them: “The vineyard of the LORD of hosts is the house of Israel.”
Notice how much the owner does before anything is asked of the vineyard. Before there is any fruit, there is spade, stone-clearing, vines, watchtower, and press. Everything is gift. The question the owner asks is almost heartbreaking: “What more was there to do for my vineyard that I had not done?”
Then comes the line that carries the whole reading. The Hebrew is a pair of puns that don’t survive translation. God looked for mishpat, justice, and found mispach, bloodshed. He looked for tzedaqah, righteousness, and heard tze’aqah, the cry of the oppressed. The words sound almost identical, and the difference between them is the whole moral life. What God wants from a people he has loved is not religious display. He wants a society in which the poor are not crying out.
Fruit, then, is not a decoration. In Scripture, fruit is what love looks like when it has been received.
“The Vineyard of the Lord Is the House of Israel”
Responsorial Psalm: Psalm 80
The psalmist prays from inside the ruin: “Why have you broken down its walls, so that every passerby plucks its fruit?” This is a prayer from someone who knows the vineyard has failed and still calls it yours. “Once again, O Lord of hosts, look down from heaven, and see; take care of this vine.”
Look at what the psalmist does not say. He does not say, “Find a better vineyard.” He asks God to visit this one, to return to the people who failed him. The plea is honest about the failure and confident about the Owner: “Give us new life, and we will call upon your name.”
“Have No Anxiety at All”
Second Reading: Philippians 4:6–9
After Isaiah and the Gospel, Paul sounds almost like a different voice. He is writing from prison, and he tells the Philippians: “Have no anxiety at all, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, make your requests known to God. Then the peace of God that surpasses all understanding will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.”
Then he gives them a program for the mind: “Whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is gracious… think about these things.” And he closes with something practical: “Keep on doing what you have learned and received and heard and seen in me.”
This is Paul’s answer to the tenants. The tenants in the parable act out of fear and grasping. They are afraid of losing what they think they own, so they clutch it, and the clutching turns to violence. Paul describes the opposite: a person who prays with thanksgiving, holds things loosely, and lets peace guard the heart. Anxiety says, “This is mine, and I must defend it.” Thanksgiving says, “This was given to me, and I must return it well.” Fruit grows in the second kind of soil.
And notice the last phrase: “keep on doing.” Paul, like Jesus, will not let faith stay a feeling. It has to be practiced.
“They Will Respect My Son”
Gospel: Matthew 21:33–43
The details of this parable are deliberate. Every hearer would have caught the echo of Isaiah, and the chief priests certainly did. The landowner is God. The vineyard is Israel, and by extension the whole people of God. The servants are the prophets. The son is Jesus himself, and “thrown out of the vineyard and killed” is a prediction of Golgotha, outside the city walls.
But look at what the tenants actually did wrong. They did not fail to keep the vineyard. They kept it well enough that it produced a harvest. Their sin is that when the owner sent for the fruit, they kept it. They forgot that they were tenants. They came to believe the vineyard was theirs, and once they believed that, everyone who arrived to remind them became a threat, even the owner’s own son.
Then Jesus asks the leaders what the owner will do, and they answer with the confidence of people who don’t yet see themselves in the story: “He will put those wretched men to a wretched death and lease the vineyard to other tenants.” They pass sentence on the tenants and don’t notice they are describing themselves.
Jesus answers with Psalm 118: “The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone.” He is the stone that was thrown out. That is the astonishing turn in this parable. The son is killed, and yet the vineyard is not lost. The rejected Son becomes the foundation of everything, and God’s answer to the murder is resurrection and a new people who bear fruit.
Preaching This Gospel Carefully
Verse 43, “the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people that will produce its fruits”, has been badly misused in history to say that the Church replaced the Jewish people. That is not what the Church teaches. St. Paul says plainly in Romans 11 that “the gifts and the call of God are irrevocable,” and the Second Vatican Council’s Nostra Aetate affirms that God’s covenant with the Jewish people has not been revoked.
Matthew is addressing the leaders of a particular moment in a family argument among Jews. The warning is to those who hold responsibility, and in every age that includes us. If we hear this parable as a story about them, we have already become the tenants. It is a story about us: bishops, priests, pastors, parents, teachers, anyone who has been entrusted with something that belongs to God.
A Story for This Sunday: The Scorched Stone
(An illustrative story, not a historical account.)
A parish in a small Ohio town lost its old church to a fire on a winter night. The morning after, the parishioners stood in the snow looking at the ruin. The bell tower had collapsed, the roof was gone, and the walls were black. The building committee that spring decided to clear everything and build new, and one of the first things to go was a large limestone block from the front corner. It had cracked in the heat and was scorched dark. The contractor called it useless.
The parish custodian, an older man named Ray, who had swept those floors for thirty years, asked if he could keep it. Nobody minded. He hauled it home on a flatbed and left it beside his garage.
When the new church was nearly finished, the pastor asked where the cornerstone would go. There was a discussion about ordering a fresh block, clean and engraved. Ray, who rarely said anything at meetings, said quietly, “I’ve got a stone.”
They set it at the northeast corner, scorched side facing out, with the date cut into it. Visitors sometimes ask why the parish would build on something so damaged. The pastor tells them it is the only stone in the building that has already been through the fire, and that the fire didn’t have the last word.
The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone. Sometimes the thing we would throw away is the thing God intends to build on, and sometimes the thing we would throw away is us.
A Saint for This Feast: St. Francis of Assisi
Today is also the memorial of St. Francis of Assisi (1181/82–1226). He may be the clearest picture in Church history of a man who finally understood he was a tenant and not an owner.
Francis grew up as the son of a wealthy cloth merchant. He had everything: money, friends, and a promising future. But he began to sense that something was missing. In the ruined chapel of San Damiano, he heard the crucifix say, “Francis, rebuild my church.” He took it literally at first, carrying stones and mortar, and only later understood the larger commission.
The turning point came in the public square. His father, furious that Francis was giving away the family’s goods, hauled him before the bishop. Francis removed his clothes, handed them back to his father, and said that from now on he would say only “Our Father who art in heaven.” He gave the vineyard back and asked for nothing. And what came of his poverty was fruit beyond counting: the Franciscan family, a renewal that swept Europe, and a witness to peace, creation, and the poor that still speaks eight centuries later.
His Canticle of the Creatures praises God through Brother Sun, Sister Moon, and Mother Earth. It is what Paul’s “prayer and petition with thanksgiving” looks like when it is lived. (The famous “Make me a channel of your peace” prayer is not actually from Francis, but it captures his spirit.) Someone who receives everything as gift does not grasp, and someone who does not grasp can be a channel of peace.
The Vineyard and the American Catholic in 2026
We Are Tenants
American culture teaches us to think of ownership: my time, my money, my opinions, my parish, my rights. The Gospel gently reverses the grammar. Our time is on loan, our talents are entrusted, and our children are gifts we are raising for someone else. Even the Church herself is not ours to run to our taste. Stewardship is not a fundraising word. It is the truth about who we are.
Fruit Is Justice
Isaiah looked for justice and heard a cry. Today, many US parishes observe Respect Life Sunday, the beginning of Respect Life Month. The Church’s vision is consistent: the unborn child, the mother in crisis, the migrant at the border, the prisoner, the elderly person in a care home, the person in the grip of addiction or despair. All belong to the Owner of the vineyard, and any of them may be the servant he sends to us. Do we hear the cry, or have we learned to walk past it?
Peace Instead of Panic
We live in an anxious time, and much of the anxiety comes from feeling that everything depends on us. Paul’s advice is not naive. He writes from a prison cell. But he insists that a mind trained on what is true, honorable, and lovely is a mind that God’s peace can guard. Some of our fruit-bearing this week may simply be to turn off what is feeding our fear and turn toward what is good.
The Rejected Stone
There is someone in your life right now whom people have thrown out: the relative nobody speaks to, the coworker everyone avoids, or perhaps yourself, on a bad day. The Gospel does not tell us the rejected stone is worthless. It tells us it is where God builds.
Homily in Five Minutes (Short Version)
For a shorter Mass or a time-pressed preacher.
Brothers and sisters, today’s readings are about a vineyard, and about what God gets back from the people he has loved.
Isaiah sings of a vineyard that receives every possible care and yields wild grapes. God looks for justice and finds bloodshed, looks for righteousness and hears a cry. Jesus tells the same story with a twist: the vineyard is fine, but the tenants forget they are tenants. When the owner sends for his share, they beat and kill his servants, and finally his Son.
The heart of the parable is that the tenants forgot the vineyard was a gift. Everything we have, our time, talents, family, and faith, is on loan from God. St. Paul, writing from prison, gives the antidote: pray with thanksgiving, do not be anxious, and let the peace of God guard your heart. A grateful heart holds things loosely, and a heart like that bears fruit.
St. Francis, whose memorial is today, understood this. He handed back even the clothes his father had given him, and God made his poverty fruitful for eight hundred years.
And the story ends well. The Son who was thrown out has become the cornerstone. This week, ask yourself: what is God looking for from me, and where have I been keeping what I was only meant to return? Whom have I thrown out who might be the cornerstone?
Scriptures to Carry Into This Week
- John 15:5, 16: “I am the vine, you are the branches… I chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit that will remain.” The Alleluia verse’s parent text: the vineyard imagery made personal.
- Galatians 5:22–23: “The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control.” A checklist for the harvest.
- Psalm 118:22–23: “The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone.” The verse Jesus quotes, worth praying whole.
- Luke 12:48: “Much will be required of the person entrusted with much.” Stewardship in one line.
- 1 Corinthians 4:1–2: “It is required of stewards that they be found trustworthy.” Paul’s simple definition of a tenant.
Conclusion: Bring the Harvest Home
Brothers and sisters, the God who dug, planted, and built for us has not stopped. He sends his servants, and he has sent his Son, and the Son who was cast out is now the cornerstone of the world.
The Owner is not looking for a perfect vineyard. He is looking for tenants who remember whose it is. So this week, give thanks before you ask for anything, do one concrete act of justice or mercy, and listen for whoever is being sent to you, because he may look very much like someone you would rather not see.
Glory and praise forever. Amen.
Take-Home for Families
- Talk at dinner: What is one thing God has given our family that we could share this week?
- Do together: Pick one neighbor or family member who feels “thrown out” and reach out with a call, card, or meal.
- Pray together: A simple grace with thanksgiving before meals. Paul’s advice to pray “with thanksgiving” starts at the table.
- For St. Francis: Take a walk and name three things in creation to thank God for.
Reflection Questions for Personal Prayer or Group Discussion
- Isaiah says God looked for justice and heard a cry. Where in your community do you hear that cry, and have you grown used to it?
- Where have you slipped into thinking “mine” about something that is really on loan from God: your time, your talents, your children, your parish?
- Paul says, “Have no anxiety at all.” What anxiety could you hand over in prayer this week, with thanksgiving?
- Who has been “thrown out” in your life, and could they be a cornerstone God intends to build on?
- St. Francis handed everything back to his Father. What is one thing you might return to God this week?
Prayers of the Faithful: 27th Sunday in Ordinary Time
Presider: Brothers and sisters, gathered in the vineyard of the Lord, let us bring our needs before the God who tends us with love.
- For Pope Leo XIV, our bishops, priests, and deacons: that they may be faithful stewards of what has been entrusted to them and lead God’s people to bear good fruit. We pray to the Lord. Lord, hear our prayer.
- For all who hold authority in government, business, and the Church: that they may seek justice, hear the cry of the poor, and remember that they are servants. We pray to the Lord. Lord, hear our prayer.
- For the protection of human life at every stage, from the unborn child to the elderly and dying, and for the mothers, families, and caregivers who need our support. We pray to the Lord. Lord, hear our prayer.
- For the anxious, the fearful, and all who cannot sleep tonight: that the peace of God which surpasses all understanding may guard their hearts and minds. We pray to the Lord. Lord, hear our prayer.
- For those who feel rejected, unwanted, or thrown out, and for all who suffer because of our neglect: that they may find in Christ, the rejected cornerstone, a home. We pray to the Lord. Lord, hear our prayer.
- In thanksgiving for St. Francis of Assisi: that his joyful poverty and love for creation may teach us to receive the world as gift. We pray to the Lord. Lord, hear our prayer.
- For farmers, harvest workers, and all who labor on the land, and for a fruitful season: we pray to the Lord. Lord, hear our prayer.
- For the sick, the grieving, and all who have asked for our prayers, and for the faithful departed: that they may rest in the mercy of the Lord. We pray to the Lord. Lord, hear our prayer.
Presider: Father, you planted us and tend us with a love that never tires. Teach us to hold your gifts with open hands, to bear the fruit you desire, and to welcome the Son whom the world rejected and you made our cornerstone. We ask this through Christ our Lord. All: Amen.
A few things to double-check before Sunday:
- Readings: please confirm the exact Lectionary text on the USCCB site.
- Papal name: the sample’s prayers name Pope Francis, but I used Pope Leo XIV, the current pope.
- Respect Life Sunday: it is observed in most US dioceses on the first Sunday of October, but confirm with your parish or diocese before mentioning it.
- Story: the “Scorched Stone” is invented for illustration and is marked as such. Swap in a real parish story if you have one.
Twenty-seventh Sunday in Ordinary Time – Mass Readings
Lectionary: 139
Reading 1
Isaiah 5:1-7
Let me now sing of my friend,
my friend’s song concerning his vineyard.
My friend had a vineyard
on a fertile hillside;
he spaded it, cleared it of stones,
and planted the choicest vines;
within it he built a watchtower,
and hewed out a wine press.
Then he looked for the crop of grapes,
but what it yielded was wild grapes.
Now, inhabitants of Jerusalem and people of Judah,
judge between me and my vineyard:
What more was there to do for my vineyard
that I had not done?
Why, when I looked for the crop of grapes,
did it bring forth wild grapes?
Now, I will let you know
what I mean to do with my vineyard:
take away its hedge, give it to grazing,
break through its wall, let it be trampled!
Yes, I will make it a ruin:
it shall not be pruned or hoed,
but overgrown with thorns and briers;
I will command the clouds
not to send rain upon it.
The vineyard of the LORD of hosts is the house of Israel,
and the people of Judah are his cherished plant;
he looked for judgment, but see, bloodshed!
for justice, but hark, the outcry!
Responsorial Psalm
Psalm 80:9, 12, 13-14, 15-16, 19-20
R. (Is 5:7a) The vineyard of the Lord is the house of Israel.
A vine from Egypt you transplanted;
you drove away the nations and planted it.
It put forth its foliage to the Sea,
its shoots as far as the River.
R. The vineyard of the Lord is the house of Israel.
Why have you broken down its walls,
so that every passer-by plucks its fruit,
The boar from the forest lays it waste,
and the beasts of the field feed upon it?
R. The vineyard of the Lord is the house of Israel.
Once again, O LORD of hosts,
look down from heaven, and see;
take care of this vine,
and protect what your right hand has planted,
the son of man whom you yourself made strong.
R. The vineyard of the Lord is the house of Israel.
Then we will no more withdraw from you;
give us new life, and we will call upon your name.
O LORD, God of hosts, restore us;
if your face shine upon us, then we shall be saved.
R. The vineyard of the Lord is the house of Israel.
Reading 2
Philippians 4:6-9
Brothers and sisters:
Have no anxiety at all, but in everything,
by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving,
make your requests known to God.
Then the peace of God that surpasses all understanding
will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.
Finally, brothers and sisters,
whatever is true, whatever is honorable,
whatever is just, whatever is pure,
whatever is lovely, whatever is gracious,
if there is any excellence
and if there is anything worthy of praise,
think about these things.
Keep on doing what you have learned and received
and heard and seen in me.
Then the God of peace will be with you.
Alleluia
Cf. John 15:16
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
I have chosen you from the world, says the Lord,
to go and bear fruit that will remain.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Gospel
Matthew 21:33-43
Jesus said to the chief priests and the elders of the people:
“Hear another parable.
There was a landowner who planted a vineyard,
put a hedge around it, dug a wine press in it, and built a tower.
Then he leased it to tenants and went on a journey.
When vintage time drew near,
he sent his servants to the tenants to obtain his produce.
But the tenants seized the servants and one they beat,
another they killed, and a third they stoned.
Again he sent other servants, more numerous than the first ones,
but they treated them in the same way.
Finally, he sent his son to them, thinking,
‘They will respect my son.’
But when the tenants saw the son, they said to one another,
‘This is the heir.
Come, let us kill him and acquire his inheritance.’
They seized him, threw him out of the vineyard, and killed him.
What will the owner of the vineyard do to those tenants when he comes?”
They answered him,
“He will put those wretched men to a wretched death
and lease his vineyard to other tenants
who will give him the produce at the proper times.”
Jesus said to them, “Did you never read in the Scriptures:
The stone that the builders rejected
has become the cornerstone;
by the Lord has this been done,
and it is wonderful in our eyes?
Therefore, I say to you,
the kingdom of God will be taken away from you
and given to a people that will produce its fruit.”
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