April 25th 2021.  Fourth Sunday of Easter

GOSPEL   John 10:11-18

Translated from a homily by Don Fabio Rosini, broadcast on Vatican Radio

Don Fabio’s reflection follows the Gospel reading . . .

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GOSPEL: John 10:11-18

Jesus said: “I am the good shepherd.

A good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.

A hired man, who is not a shepherd

and whose sheep are not his own,

sees a wolf coming and leaves the sheep and runs away,

and the wolf catches and scatters them.

This is because he works for pay and has no concern for the sheep.

I am the good shepherd,

and I know mine and mine know me,

just as the Father knows me and I know the Father;

and I will lay down my life for the sheep.

I have other sheep that do not belong to this fold.

These also I must lead, and they will hear my voice,

and there will be one flock, one shepherd.

This is why the Father loves me,

because I lay down my life in order to take it up again.

No one takes it from me, but I lay it down on my own.

I have power to lay it down, and power to take it up again.

This command I have received from my Father.”

The Gospel of the Lord: Praise to you Lord Jesus Christ

SHORT HOMILY . . . The Good Shepherd lays down his life for his sheep, unlike the mercenary who doesn’t care about them. This discourse follows on the healing by Jesus of a man born blind. The blind man is not just physically healed, but also comes to the spiritual vision of Jesus as Christ and Saviour. Jesus is forging a radical new relationship between the people and God. It is not only the Jewish religious leaders who are fixated with norms and prescriptions. All of us have the tendency to treat God as an outsider who must be placated with our practices and observances. The Good Shepherd, by contrast, is not an outsider of this sort. Because life has many dangers, with many wolves lying in wait, the sheep seek security by entrusting themselves to the hired mercenary. But this is a relationship of convenience only. It will never cross the threshold where the mercenary sacrifices his life for the sheep. Without the salvation that Jesus brings, life is lived by trying to figure out how I can get as much as possible by giving as little as possible. Jesus brings a completely different approach to life! A life that can be given away and still not lost because it is eternal life. The life that the Father gives to the Son is the same life. We tend to always feel fragile and incomplete, but when we follow the Good Shepherd we are liberated from the oppression of fear. We tend to be constantly in a state of self-defence, but when we abandon ourselves with trust into the arms of Our Lord, we experience a change of life. Jesus remarks that he has many other sheep that are not of this fold. How can they too be drawn under his protection? By meeting other sheep (like us hopefully) who have been fed and nurtured by him. When a person has entrusted himself to this Good Shepherd, the results are obvious because his serenity irradiates to others. As St Paul says in the letter to the Romans, for those who are in Christ Jesus there can be no more condemnation - the wolf has no further power. Once we are in Christ, we are no longer seeking to earn the approval of God. A father does not love his son because his son deserves it, but because he is his son. We can live a life that is nourished by the founts of existence, by the waters of life, the life that comes from the Father to us through Jesus. Sometimes we feel abandoned in life. Sometimes we entrust ourselves to mercenaries, to illusory things that bring fleeting comfort or security. As the first reading from St Peter exhorts, let us return to the true shepherd and guardian of our souls.

LONGER HOMILY FOLLOWS

Jesus is not looking for mechanical obedience from us; he is looking for true listening and openness to his word

The analogy of the sheep and the shepherd illuminates the relationship between God and us: the sheep recognize the voice of the shepherd and they find pasture by his guidance. So too for us the sense of listening is vital: for faith, listening is the most important of the five senses, since the relationship with the Lord is conveyed by the reception of his word. In Hebrew the verb "to obey" does not exist. Instead, the verb "to listen" is used, because true listening implies an authentic openness to what the other person is saying. But for Jesus this listening leads to the deepest level, that of "knowing", which in Hebrew does not mean having information about someone or something, but being in an intimate relationship with someone. Being known by Jesus means experiencing intimacy with him and it is this which leads us to follow him.

We are called to follow Jesus, not in the sense of superficially agreeing with some code of behaviour, but because we listen to him and are loved by him

How beautiful it is when someone understands us deeply! Love implies understanding and the ability to perceive what is in the innermost centre of the other, in his heart. Jesus knows us - even if we do not fully know ourselves - and it is He alone who knows how to reveal our true identity. We are Christians not because we are superficially in agreement with what Jesus says, but because we feel known to him. Following him flows naturally from listening to his word and experiencing the relationship with him, which is something indelible and which marks us in a permanent and beautiful way.

The Lord speaks his word to me. If I receive that word with openness then I will know myself to be visited and understood by the Lord. This is the foundation of my self-confidence. The eternal has visited me. My misery and weakness are no longer decisive

The stability of our existence derives from our memory of the occasions in which we felt visited and understood by the Lord. If we succeed in keeping alive in our hearts the memory of such moments, no one will be able to shake us, because we are those sheep who "will not be lost ". In fact, that which is eternal has entered us through the word we have heard and through what we have celebrated in the sacraments. That I am weak and miserable matters less than the fact that Jesus really loved me. No-one can erase this fact that is written in my heart.

The word that the Lord is speaking to us draws us into unity with the Father and with each other. We may be anxious sometimes, but if Jesus is our shepherd then no harm can befall us. We must stick close to him and he will draw us into communion with the Father

And there is more: to know Jesus is to know the Father, or He who is "greater". There is always a certain anxiety lurking in our hearts, but to be Jesus' sheep means, precisely, to experience the Father who "is greater than all", and no one can tear anything from the hand of the Father. Saint Paul says: "If God is for us, who will be against us?" (Rom 8:31). No power in heaven and on earth, including death, can separate us from God's love. How much we torture ourselves with useless anxieties! We are like sheep that move away from the shepherd to affirm our independence, but all we succeed in doing is reducing our existence to a great chaotic struggle. Instead, we are called to live united to the very simplicity of God, hidden in that grand final phrase - "The Father and I are one" - which opens to communion without limits and to complete unity. This unity is love and it is the secret of God. We were born to receive a word from the Lord that makes us feel known (“My sheep hear my voice; I know them, and they follow me . .”). That word leads us to the union that only the love of God can create. Union with Him and between us.