25th SUNDAY OF THE YEAR

PRIEST: Today we hear the Lord’s call to each one of us to work in His vineyard … the world. He challenges us to build up His Kingdom upon the earth.  Even if we respond only at the eleventh hour, He rewards us with a most generous love that fulfils the yearnings of our heart and completes our joy.  Those going at the eleventh hour as we hear in today’s Gospel, represent those who are normally excluded and marginalised, but whom God calls and wants to be co-workers in the mission of the Church. Will we leave behind our sense of earlier rejection and recognise God’s urgent calling and answer with the gift of ourselves with renewed confidence?  Surely it is our deepest joy to share our faith and to proclaim His Gospel to our own people, our own city. Are we faithful to His calling,  do we work for His Kingdom everyday?

READER:              For narrowness of heart and meanness of the spirit
that does not welcome others who might be different from ourselves,
                                   that is not willing to share the work of Christ with one another

                                                          LORD HAVE MERCY …

For not answering God’s call to share the Good News,
for allowing past rejections to stop us responding to God’s urgent call
for our lack of enthusiasm in working in God’s Vineyard

                                                          CHRIST HAVE MERCY …

When our ways are not God’s ways,
                                    our thoughts are not God’s thoughts;
when we fail to challenge our society to change according to the Gospel

                                                          LORD HAVE MERCY …

PRIEST:              May the God who calls us,
                                       forgive us every failure to serve,
                                             send us once more into His Vineyard,
                                                   heal us by His mercy of the wounds of past rejection
                                 and bring us to everlasting life

                                                             AMEN!

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