If the Lord is my shepherd, am I a sheep? The image of a sheep is not a flattering one yet the bottom line is this; God knows that we need good shepherding to lead us through life. Otherwise, we can easily go astray. At every stage of life, we need direction. A child needs the guidance of a parent, students need the direction of a teacher, employees need the supervision of an employer, citizens need the vision of civic leaders from the White House down to city hall, and parishioners need the spiritual tutelage of good Church leaders from the Holy Father down to their pastors.
We have many leaders, but as Jeremiah observes in the first reading, not every shepherd is to be trusted. He quotes God as chastising the leaders of ancient Israel for leading the people astray. “Woe to the shepherds who scatter the flock of my pasture. You have driven them away.”
You may think the message here is archaic but what we hear is a mirror of our times as well. I think back to my childhood. The Pill hadn’t been invented yet, abortion wasn’t legal, and it was quite all right to pray in school assemblies. I never thought then that in the name of freedom, those shepherds, whom we call justices of the Supreme Court, would define a certain immorally gruesome act as legal and another morally wholesome act as illegal. What price are we paying as a nation when the unborn child is not given the freedom to live and we, the living, aren’t given the freedom to pray in public? We are paying dearly with sexual violence, domestic abuse, alcohol and drug addiction that result in broken families and destroyed lives.
God knows this brokenness results from following false shepherds who lead us astray with empty assurances. To Jeremiah, God promised to bring the scattered flocks back to their meadow by raising up a king who would govern wisely.
That promise was fulfilled when Jesus arrived on the scene. Calling himself the good shepherd, he could see that many in his midst were “like sheep without a shepherd; and he began to teach them many things.” In his wake, Jesus left the Church to serve as our spiritual shepherd.
After 2000 years, one would expect the world to be in much better shape than it was in the days of ancient Israel but what Jeremiah described then is just as true today. Sadly not all leaders shepherd well.
Which shepherds in our lives do we trust and really listen to? I would like to think that every Christian really listens to the wisdom of Jesus, the Good Shepherd, but that isn’t so. Otherwise, our churches would be overflowing with people following the advice in today’s gospel. That to me is what Jesus had in mind when he invited his disciples to “come away by yourselves to a deserted place and rest.”
We live busy lives so Jesus is urging us to get away from the daily events of our lives and take time to rejuvenate our spiritual beings. Taking a break from our daily routine doesn’t mean filling the moment with leisure but finding tranquility and awe in the presence of God through prayer, not just here at Mass but also in solitude as well.
Thanks to cell phones, laptops, and the internet, many people find themselves working as the expression goes, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, even when they are not technically at work. That is a guaranteed formula for breakdown. Instead of mimicking the energizer bunny that keeps on going and going and going, we need to take time out to recharge our spiritual and emotional batteries. We need to get in touch with the core of our being, especially with God who dwells there.
Blaise Pascal, a 17th century French philosopher, observed, “All the troubles of life come upon us because we refuse to sit quietly for awhile each day in our rooms.” We need a sanctuary in our lives. Some people find theirs early in the morning with a walk at dawn, in the garden, here at daily Mass, or alone in their bedroom or living room. One woman speaks of lighting a candle at night for 15 minutes and sitting quietly to “keep my sanity.” Another one prays early in the morning with a cup of coffee before anyone else gets up.
One Jesuit offers this bit of advice, “Make your prayer simple, as simple as you can. Reason little, love much, and you will pray well.”
However and wherever we find this solitude, it is essential for our faith, just as sleep is for our good health. If we would regularly make time for prayer and worship, we will find the grace we need to make the right choices for our daily journey.
Somewhere I read that a man without prayer is like a tree without roots. By choosing to dwell in the house of the Lord, we will stay on the right path. With God at our side to guide us, we need fear no evil, our faith will remain rooted and we will find ourselves truly rested.