Pastors and Parents
(About
All of Us)
Introduction
Last Sunday we finished
off the homily in the lofty heights of St. Peter’s Basilica, that marvelous
miracle in marble. Way up there, written with letters in gold mosaic, ten feet
tall, both in Latin and in Greek, is that famous job-interview between Jesus
and Peter, in which Jesus asks Peter three times, “Do you love me?” When the
job-interview comes to a successful end, Jesus confers upon Peter a universal
pastorate over the whole church, saying,
“Peter, feed my sheep. Feed my lambs. Feed my sheep” (Jn 21:15-19).
Sheep, shepherds, and
shepherding is favorite imagery in Christianity. A hallowed word which Catholics and Protestants use for their
priests and ministers is “pastor.” “Pastor” (as well as “pastorate,” “pastoral,” and
“pasture”) comes from the Latin word “pascor” which means to feed hungry sheep, to lead them to green
pastures. Our favorite psalm says, “The
Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want. He leads me into green pastures, and
there gives me repose” (Psalm 21).
Jesus takes that imagery to myself when he
declares, “Ego sum, pastor bonus. I am the good shepherd” (Jn 10:14). He uses that imagery to craft a parable
describing God’s: it’s like that of a good shepherd who leaves behind
ninety-nine sheep and goes in search of the one sheep that’s lost. When found, he hoists the animal upon his
shoulder and carries the bleating lamb home.
A
favorite shepherd
We call to mind a very favorite shepherd. He was
born and baptized Angelo Roncalli. Upon the death of Pope Pius XII in 1958, the
cardinals elected him to the universal pastorate. He took the name of Pope John XXIII. On the day of his coronation,
Nov. 4th, 1958 (they used to “crown” popes in those days), against all tradition he rose to deliver
the homily. “Different people,” he said, “have different ideas about what the
new pope should be: diplomat, scholar, statesman. The new pope," he said,
"has in mind St. John's example of the Jesus, the Good Shepherd, who came
not to be served but to serve.” Then
Good Pope John removed his triple tiered tiara (that ostentatious toy of papal
power), and he dismounted from his sedia gestatoria (that portable papal
throne), he went forth to shepherd the universal church.
The day after
his coronation, he put his money where
his mouth was: off through elaborate Vatican portals he sped to visit prisoners
in Roman jails and to console aging priests in nursing homes. That was, indeed,
good shepherding. When his first Holy Thursday as Pope came around in 1959, he
restored the ancient liturgical custom of foot washing, by bending down and
washing the feet of thirteen young priests. Though only symbolic, it was,
indeed, wonderful shepherding. Then in 1962 he did the “inexauditum,” the “unheard
of” by inviting the Orthodox, Protestants, and Jews, even Atheists to the
bittersweet banquet of Vatican II.
Though that was “unheard of,” it was, indeed, very good shepherding.
Talking about us all
Just as the second Sunday
after Easter is always Doubting Thomas Sunday, so the fourth Sunday
after Easter is always Good Shepherd Sunday. On that Sunday the pews
always think we’re talking only about
“those people over there,” that is to say, only about “the hierarchy,”
only about priests, bishops, and popes.
Can’t blame the pews; the pulpit often gives that impression. The hierarchy in the pulpit, speaking of
good shepherds and good shepherding, often gives the impression that it is
speaking only about itself. That’s too self-centered.
On Good Shepherd Sunday, we
are talking about all of us. The
world is not divided into two neat parts:
on the one side are the shepherds (i.e. hierarchy) and on the other side
are the sheep (the faithful). That’s not the way it really is. We are all sheep who, at one time or the
other, sooner or later, need to be shepherded, need to be led and fed. But it
is also true that we are all shepherds who, at one time or the other, sooner or
later, have to shepherd someone, have to lead and feed someone. This is true especially
of mothers and fathers. Parenting is shepherding par excellence.
(Repeat.) Parents are shepherds too, and their children are sheep who need
shepherding. We are talking not about
some of us but about all of us.
Good
shepherds know.
On Good Shepherd Sunday,
the Alleluia Verse before the gospel is always the same for all three
cycles "Alleluia. Alleluia. I am a
good shepherd. I know my sheep and my sheep know me"(Jn
10:14-15). Shepherds are good for a number of reasons (e.g. they protect the
sheep from the wolf or they lead the sheep to feed in green pastures). The Alleluia
Verse emphasizes the fact that good shepherds know their sheep.
I
am a good pastor: I know my parishioners.
"Alleluia. Alleluia.
I am a good shepherd. I know my
sheep and they know me.” Alleluia, alleluia. I am a good pastor. I know
my parishioners and they know me. I
know, for example, that most of them don’t lose much sleep over a celibate or
married priesthood, and even over a male or female priesthood. I know that most of them don’t agonize over
sacramental confession or over artificial birth control, or even over divorce
and remarriage, as we used to agonize in times past.
Alleluia, alleluia! I am
a good pastor. I know my parishioners.
I know, for example, that there is an ever increasing number of them out
there who are homosexuals but who don’t lose much sleep over themselves
anymore, and who have quietly and peacefully settled down to life in the church
(with no intention to leave it). And I know there is a good number of my
parishioners out there who are straight but who no longer lose any sleep over
such people, and who have settled down to quiet and peaceful acceptance. I know
that most of my parishioners out there have either solved these matters for
themselves, or simply don't see what the problem is, or just couldn't care
less. I might not like those facts but
they’re there, and good shepherds know and admit that they are there.
Alleluia, alleluia! I am
a good shepherd. I know my sheep. I
know what they really lose sleep over. I know that they are concerned
with the bottom line. I know that many of them are disturbed right now at the
price of gas two dollars a gallon, just as last winter they were disturbed at
their incredible heating bills. I know that some of them are overwhelmed with
the task of getting a job, and, in this age of downsizing, of holding on
to it. I know that others are burdened
with the terrible ordeal of trying to get the monkey of addiction off
their own backs or the backs of someone they love very much. I know that
fathers and mothers are beset now with a brand new fear: the fear
that their kid is going to be massacred in school today.
Alleluia, alleluia! I am
a good pastor. I know my parishioners. Though the economy might still be basically
good and inflation still in check, though welfare and even violent crime might
be down, I know the basic discontent which consumes my parishioners:
they longer have any prime-time: no prime-time for their children, no
prime-time for their spouses, no prime-time for themselves. I know that they
are often exhausted trying to make a living but have very little prime time to
live.
I
am a good parent: I know my kids.
But today, we said, we
are talking not about some of us but about all of us. Alleluia, alleluia, I am a good shepherd.
I am a good parent. I know my
kids, and they know me.
If the nation has learned anything from the school massacre in Columbine High in Littleton, Colorado, it is this: parents no longer know their kids. Shepherds no longer know their sheep. It’s a real crisis in family life today. There are huge chunks of time in the lives of their children about which parents know absolutely nothing. There are so-called “sacred” spaces of privacy or rather secrecy that parents may not invade.
This is not just some problem of inner city kids bearing Afro-american or Latino names; this is a problem of suburban kids bearing lily-white names like Eric Harris or Dylan Klebold. How is it possible that those two young adults could be plotting the total destruction of a high school, and could be concocting weapons of mass destruction in the basements of their respectable homes, and their parent not know of it? We shall never cease wondering about that. And some of us start wondering, who should be thrown into jail: the sheep or the shepherd, the kid or the parents?
Alleluia, alleluia! I am
a good parent. I know my kids. I know
if they’re taking drugs. I know if they are having sex.
Alleluia, alleluia! I am
a good parent. I know my kids. I know
if they are building an arsenal of
guns and ammunition in a basement room that’s off limits for me, the landlord.
Alleluia, alleluia! I am a good parent. I know my kids. I know if they’re hurting, and I know what they are hurting about. I know whether peer monsters and bullies in school are victimizing them. And I know that that spells disaster in this new age of ours, which settles a score not by giving the other guy a black eye but by blowing off his head. It’s a brand new world.
I
know because….
And I know this all
because I have prime-time for my kids, and if I don’t have prime-time
for them, I make prime-time for them, because anything else is too great a
price to pay. Ask the parents of Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris.
And perhaps even more
importantly, I know this all because I have offered my kids freedom from
my intimidation of them which forces them to offer me an image of themselves
that they think I’m looking for. Or which forces them to tell me the lie that
they think I want to hear from them. I
know all this about my kids because I have offered them freedom for
telling me absolutely everything about themselves. I have offered them the
invitation to be honest with me. The
path of honesty is a lot more messy than the path of intimidation, but in the
long run it really pays off.
(No
more pretense)
The Church must offer the
faithful the same invitation to honesty.
That would do away with much of the pretense that goes on in our
midst: the pretense about gays (that they’re
not there); the pretense about divorce (sometimes called annulments); the
pretense about birth control (that Catholics don’t practice it); the pretense
about the ever-widening gap between
hierarchy and the faithful (that it really doesn’t exist); the pretense
about shepherds knowing the sheep and the sheep knowing their shepherds (we
don’t know each other).
We are being told these
days that this is the first generation that doesn't have it materially better
than their parents. We shouldn't let that throw us off. What our children need
from us now are not more good things. What they need now is more good
shepherding. Today, on Good Shepherd Sunday, we are talking not just about some of us but about all of us.