The Joy Is in the Game - Catholic Herald

Stand-up comedian Brian Regan has a great bit on his experience of Little League Baseball as a boy. Assigned to the outfield because, quite frankly, he stunk, he recalls:

“All I knew is at the end of the game, I’d get a free snow cone. That’s all I knew, you know? I’d be out there [thinking], ‘Oh, free snow cone. Free snow cone.’”

“Brian, what’s the score?” someone would ask.

“Free snow cone,” he’d respond. “Free snow cone at the end of the game. If you play, they’re going to give you a free snow cone. Even if you play a half game, you get the whole — you don’t get a half snow cone — you get a whole snow cone for half the game. The people that play a whole game get a whole snow cone, and the people that play a half game get a whole snow cone. So, it’s always whole … always whole snow cone. So, I’d rather play half game … get the whole snow cone.”

“How many outs, Brian?” someone would persist.

“Grape! I’m going to get grape or cherry. They’re both favorites. So, either one is good. If they have both, I’ll get grape, though, because that’s a little more favorite.”

In addition to being hilarious, the vignette apparently contains the wisdom of the Kingdom of Heaven. The very same dynamic is at play in our Gospel this Sunday, where we hear of the laborers who grumble after working a 12-hour day — dawn to dusk — through the heat of the day — and are then shocked to find themselves paid the same daily wage (a “denarius”) as the duds hired at 5 o’clock, who work for only an hour, in the cool of the evening. “These last ones worked only one hour, and you have made them equal to us, who bore the day’s burden and the heat,” they complain. (Matthew 20:12)

Giving all the kids a snow cone after Little League regardless of their athletic prowess (or innings borne) is one thing. Paying the same amount for one or twelve hours of hard labor in the scorching heat is another. The one makes you smile at kids. The other makes you rail against injustice.

So, what is our Lord getting at with his image of this landowner? He is generous, yes. But if his generosity is so worth writing home about (or Gospels about), couldn’t he also have paid the 12-hour crew at twelve times the usual daily wage?

And is it not also true that some seeds bear more fruit than others, “a hundred or sixty or thirtyfold”? (Matthew 13:23) And does not the master give a greater reward to the servant who earns a better return on his money by investing wisely? (cf. Matthew 25:14-30)

St. Augustine, thankfully, rescues us from our confusion, interpreting the daily wage as a symbol of eternal life.

“In that great reward,” he writes, “we shall all be equal — the first to the last and the last to the first. For the denarius stands for eternal life, in which all will have the same share. Although through diversity of merit some will shine more brilliantly than others, in the possession of eternal life there will be equality. What is endless for all will not be longer for one and shorter for another. What has no bounds will have none either for you or for me. Those who lived chastely in the married state will have one kind of splendor; virgins will have another. The reward for good works will differ from the crown of martyrdom; but where eternal life is concerned there can be no question of more or less for anyone. Whatever may be the individual’s degree of glory, each one will live in it eternally. This is the meaning of the denarius.” (Augustine, Sermon 87, 1.5-6; trans. E. Barnecutt)

All the same, if you can get the snow cone with a final act of contrition on your deathbed, why slave away like St. Teresa of Calcutta your whole life? Why not have your pagan cake, which seems rather fun and tasty, and a Christian snow cone too?

True baseball players know the answer. Snow cones are good. But baseball is the joy! You don’t play baseball just to get a snow cone. You play baseball because it makes your heart sing; because the smell of the grass enchants you and the grit of the dirt inspires you; because hitting for the cycle is something to remember and pitching a no-hitter is the stuff of legends. Saints like Teresa know the joy of the kingdom. They don’t wait to the end to start enjoying its delights. They live its wisdom early and enjoy every inning and so become the stuff of legends- — with a snow cone to boot.