+ On this “Good Shepherd” Sunday, it is fitting to talk about vocations, especially to the priesthood! The priesthood, of course was instituted by Christ at the Last Supper that he ate with his disciples. After he gives his all really and truly by changing the essential substance of the bread and the wine into his own body and blood which would be equally and unequivocally given the next day on the Cross at Calvary, he tells this band of brothers to “do this from then on, in his memory;” thereby vivifying the very act of remembrance and doing what he did – until the very end of time!
In
the commission of doing comes the institution of the sacrament of Holy Orders. The
Twelve would from then on be priests of the New Testament with, through and in
Jesus their Lord, their Brother and their best Friend.
I think that it could be safe
to say that Jesus asked them, in preparing them for that great moment or
ordination, three questions: 1) Can you suffer, extraordinarily? 2) Can you
pray, uncommonly deeply? 3) Can you be a friend to others, exhaustively and to
the very end? He didn’t ask them if they were smart, if they went to college,
or if they were on the dean’s list: he asked them the practical question of
life as a shepherd, which would mirror his life as shepherd. Not that
intelligence, and academic ability is not very important for the modern priest,
but what is most important is whether the candidate can suffer, really suffer;
pray, really pray; and be a friend to all kinds of people, to the very end?
And isn’t this actually what
Jesus’ Father must have asked his Son, the Word, (Second Person of the Blessed
Trinity) who volunteered to come to earth to save us from our sin: Son, can you
suffer? can you pray? can you be a true friend and shepherd of those people to
the bitter end – which would mean a brutal death on the cross? Jesus
immediately said: YES! YES! YES! for them and for their salvation I am ready to
go! And he came to us as our friend, as our shepherd, as our Lord and God.
St. John Paul II in his
apostolic exhortation: Pastores Dabo
Vobis states emphatically that God
will provide “shepherds after his own heart” – which is the same as the
Sacred Heart of Jesus! In the day of a declining number of priests we must hold
firm to this prophecy from Jeremiah that will not just fade away. God will
always provide shepherds, so long as young, and these days even not so young
men listen and respond to the call to
feel his loving look upon them and to respond enthusiastically to Jesus when he
asks them to follow him without reserve.
O Mary, Mother of Jesus Christ
and Mother of priests, guide those who courageously and lovingly wish to
investigate a life of service to the Church as priests of the New Testament,
shepherds after the heart of Jesus; protect and strengthen their vocations, and
help us with you to offer our full measure of support and prayers for so noble
and generous a commitment!
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