Homily - Good Shepherd Sunday

My homily notes for today's Good Shepherd Sunday, the 4th Sunday of Easter, are below.

Here's the YouTube video.

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Fourth Sunday of Easter – May 3, 2020 [Good Shepherd Sunday]

When I was a boy, I lived I a city neighborhood full of city blocks with houses right next to each other, about 10 or 12 to a block.  Even though the houses were close together, we had deep yards that backed up to a freeway service drive with a public sidewalk separating them. Too, a lot of folks had dogs that they would want to let run loose in their back yards.  So almost all of us had some form of fencing – usually just a metal chain link fence – both to keep people out of the yards who were walking along the service drive sidewalk behind the house or keep their pets in.  On top of that, there was a whole slew of kids on the block – we had 13 children in my household, the neighbors next to us had seven, and their neighbors had nine – intermingled with several widow ladies who lived alone after their husbands died.  I am sure they were happy to have fences up to prevent kids from running through their yards, which we were wont to do despite their best efforts to keep us out.  Often, because we lived in a city and there was some crime, we would have a gate in that chain link fence which was carefully padlocked shut: only to be opened when we knew someone who needed to come in. 

Of course, as kids, we would play all sorts of games that required us to have a lot of space across the yards – kick-the-can, capture-the-flag, and so on.  They often required the run of the block.  Much to the chagrin of the widow ladies in the neighborhood, we would sometimes sneak through from yard to yard to kick the can or hunt the flag or whatever by going along the back ends of the yards, along the freeway service drive which was darker and less visible, and just try to hop the fence into the desired yard where we needed to be.

Now that usually worked.  Even for unathletic kids like me, I could manage to hop the chain-link fence so long as I had a good running start.  But it didn’t always work.  Decades after the incident, I distinctly remember one neighbor boy – Randy – who in the haste of a game tried to hop the fence quickly and missed – breaking his leg in the process.  He couldn’t quite get high enough in his leap and so just caught the tip of his tennis shoe in the chain linking, and came crashing down full weight, on the other leg, still partially suspended.  Not a pretty sight.

I was thinking about all of this in light of the Gospel we heard today – because I don’t know much about sheep and shepherding from my own experience but do know a lot about fences.

Especially now as an middle-aged slightly overweight and out of shape man who would really struggle to hop a fence, if I could do so at all – I’m very grateful that we do have gates.

So I really want to focus on that “gate” part of the Good Shepherd Gospel.  We’re all familiar with the “I am the Good Shepherd” part that comes right after this reading.  What Catholic kid did not have a holy card or bedroom plaque with a picture of Jesus lovingly draping a sheep over His shoulders?  But what about the “I am the door / I am the Gate” part we hear today?   We’re less familiar with that, meditate on that less – but it’s equally important.

The point is that we need Jesus Christ as the gate, the way to Our Heavenly Father, the only door into the green pastures of Heaven.  The Church Fathers did not have kind things to say about those who tried to persuade others that they could live well and not follow Christ.  That was the way to grave spiritual danger.  Much as that boy, Randy, hurt himself badly trying to hop the fence because the heat of the moment in the game did not allow time to unlock a gate – so too with those who think they can attain eternal happiness and Heaven without Jesus Christ and His holy Catholic Church.  They are playing a very dangerous game.  Jesus Himself says this countless times and in countless ways: “No one comes to the Father except through me.”

It would be a whole other homily to answer people’s questions and objections about exactly what happens to those who don’t know Christ or His Church and how they get to Heaven, or ask about people who leave the Church.  The point for now is, for those who have been taught about Jesus and His Catholic Church, there is no reason not to strive to enter through the Door Who is Christ– the only sure and certain path to the Father and heavenly glory.

Our Lord Jesus Christ knows that we can only be partially satisfied by what is available to us on earth – as good as that might be – and that we will never be truly satisfied until we can enter into that state of happiness we were created for – Heavenly Communion.  So in His great love for us, He shepherds us there.  But just like finding the good pasture and being protected from missteps and enemies is not automatic for a sheep – it needs a shepherd to guide it – it’s the same in our spiritual life: getting to Heaven is not automatic.  We need Christ and His Church and the sacraments to get there – especially as St. Peter reminds every generation in the acts of the Apostles – “Repent and be baptized – save yourself from this corrupt generation.”  To get to Heaven, we can’t just flow along with whatever the world teaches us and values at the moment:  Instead, we have to constantly re-form ourselves to what Jesus teaches and values.

We shouldn’t care what others think, what the world thinks.  As St. Peter so beautifully puts it, we should only care about what Jesus our shepherd and guardian thinks and always seek His forgiveness if we fail Him: “By His wounds you have been healed.  For you had gone astray like sheep but you have now returned to the shepherd and guardian of your souls!”  If Jesus is the Door, then the Church Fathers teach us, the Holy Spirit is the “doorman,” the porter.  That is, when we pray daily – and we should – He helps us listen to the voice of Christ, He helps us to know the voice of the Shepherd.  He helps us to understand why the Church teaches what she does, to help the flock get to Heaven.  He helps us develop a “baloney detector” when people are distorting the truth of the Church.  And there is no shortage of that these days, of the “thieves and robbers” who try to twist the Church’s teaching to their own personal fads and beliefs and self-interest.

One final thought on this, again from the beautiful teaching of the Church Fathers on this Gospel.  If we can only enter the Heavenly pastures through Jesus Christ the Door, then we have to conform ourselves to the shape of that door.  Specifically, we have to imitate and share in the suffering of Christ and we have to imitate the humility of Jesus Christ.  Jesus is God Who became man to save us and bring us to Heaven.  Was so humble that He suffered and died for us.  We are often tempted to be men who become God – that is, ignore what Our Heavenly Father teaches and reveals and do whatever makes us feel good instead.  That is a dangerous lack of humility.  If we can’t learn to follow Christ, rather than try to lead Him – we can never get to that heavenly pasture.  Let’s pray in gratitude that Jesus is the Door, is the Good Shepherd.  And pray for the humility always to listen to His voice through the shepherds of our Church.

Fourth Sunday of Easter
Lectionary: 49

Reading 1 Acts 2:14a, 36-41

Then Peter stood up with the Eleven,
raised his voice, and proclaimed:
“Let the whole house of Israel know for certain
that God has made both Lord and Christ,
this Jesus whom you crucified.”
Now when they heard this, they were cut to the heart,
and they asked Peter and the other apostles,
“What are we to do, my brothers?”
Peter said to them,
“Repent and be baptized, every one of you,
in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins;
and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.
For the promise is made to you and to your children
and to all those far off,
whomever the Lord our God will call.”
He testified with many other arguments, and was exhorting them,
“Save yourselves from this corrupt generation.”
Those who accepted his message were baptized,
and about three thousand persons were added that day.

Responsorial Psalm 23: 1-3a, 3b4, 5, 6

R. (1) The Lord is my shepherd; there is nothing I shall want.
The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want. In verdant pastures he gives me repose;
beside restful waters he leads me; he refreshes my soul….

Reading 2 1 Pt 2:20b-25

Beloved: If you are patient when you suffer for doing what is good, this is a grace before God.
For to this you have been called, because Christ also suffered for you,
leaving you an example that you should follow in his footsteps.
He committed no sin, and no deceit was found in his mouth.
When he was insulted, he returned no insult;
when he suffered, he did not threaten;
instead, he handed himself over to the one who judges justly.
He himself bore our sins in his body upon the cross,
so that, free from sin, we might live for righteousness.
By his wounds you have been healed.  For you had gone astray like sheep,
but you have now returned to the shepherd and guardian of your souls.

Alleluia Jn 10:14

I am the good shepherd, says the Lord;
I know my sheep, and mine know me.

Gospel Jn 10:1-10

Jesus said:
“Amen, amen, I say to you,
whoever does not enter a sheepfold through the gate
but climbs over elsewhere is a thief and a robber.
But whoever enters through the gate is the shepherd of the sheep.
The gatekeeper opens it for him, and the sheep hear his voice,
as the shepherd calls his own sheep by name and leads them out.
When he has driven out all his own,
he walks ahead of them, and the sheep follow him,
because they recognize his voice.
But they will not follow a stranger;
they will run away from him,
because they do not recognize the voice of strangers.”
Although Jesus used this figure of speech,
the Pharisees did not realize what he was trying to tell them.
So Jesus said again, “Amen, amen, I say to you,
I am the gate for the sheep.
All who came before me are thieves and robbers,
but the sheep did not listen to them.
I am the gate.
Whoever enters through me will be saved,
and will come in and go out and find pasture.
A thief comes only to steal and slaughter and destroy;
I came so that they might have life and have it more abundantly.”