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Good Shepherd Sunday 2006
Vocation in the Mystery of the Church
by Fr Anthony Denton
SUNDAY 7 MAY 2006 MARKS THE 43RD celebration of the annual World Day of Prayer for Vocations. More popularly known as ‘Good Shepherd Sunday,’ the day is an opportunity for the Church to reflect upon the theme of vocations and to pray for more of them. Good Shepherd Sunday is held every year on the Fourth Sunday of Easter when the third reading in each of the three years of the lectionary is taken from Chapter 10 of the Gospel according to John. This chapter presents several images of Christ as Gateway into the Pasture, as Shepherd of the flock and as Guardian of His sheep.
This year the principal theme of the gospel is that of the sacrifice sometimes asked of the shepherd who cares for the sheep entrusted to him. The Good Shepherd is he who not only guides his sheep but who is prepared to “lay down his life for his sheep.” Seen as an image of the pastors of the Church (priests and bishops), the Good Shepherd so loves his sheep that he would even shed his blood for them. This is contrasted with the hired hand, whose concern for the sheep is motivated by monetary interests. The very title ‘shepherd’ suggests a vocation to lead his flock and to guide it to the safety of the pasture regardless of pecuniary benefits. It is a specialist position and one that requires a commitment rooted in love.
In his message for this year’s World Day of Prayer for Vocations, Pope Benedict has written about the mystery of divine love, which is demonstrated by the death of Jesus. The self-sacrifice of Jesus on the Cross, which we have just commemorated in the Easter Triduum, is the quintessential laying down of a life for others. The Holy Father sets his reflections on vocations in the context of divine filiation. Every one of us is a son or daughter of God, so loved by God that he calls out to us and awaits our response. Unless we truly know and feel ourselves to be children of God we cannot respond to His mysterious plan for our lives, whatever that may be.
The Vocations theme enables the Church to highlight on this Sunday two of the states in life that baptised Christians are called to, namely Priesthood and Consecrated Life. There are other Sundays when the readings lend themselves to an elaboration on Christian Marriage. The Priesthood and Religious Life presuppose the universal call to holiness of all the faithful, whereby every Christian by virtue of baptism is called by God to grow closer to Him as their life progresses. This reality does not, however, allow us to overlook the call to pastoral leadership in the Church as simply another option. Given the pressures of contemporary culture, which weigh heavily against the commitment required of the Priesthood and Consecrated life, there must be a concerted effort to promote a counter-culture which seeks to foster vocations. As Pope Benedict says in his message, “The mission of the priest in the Church is irreplaceable.”
In the Archdiocese of Melbourne the Vocations Office undertakes various initiatives for Good Shepherd Sunday. Thanks to the generosity of many parishes, the seminarians from Corpus Christi College are able to go out and speak at masses around the Archdiocese on this weekend. They speak of their call to follow the Lord; of the Church’s understanding of the priesthood; of their hopes for their future ministry. They invite other young men to an inquiry day, which will be held at the seminary a few weeks later. In general they ask the parishioners to pray for vocations and to do all that they can to cultivate a hospitable climate in which vocations can flourish.
We also produce a Vocations poster to help in promote vocations to the Priesthood. It has become more and more clear that young people in particular today relate to slogans and symbols. We try and use simple yet striking imagery with a punchy catchphrase. This year we have borrowed from the timeless and legendary status of the Blues Brothers: “We’re on a mission from God.” This ties in perfectly with what the Church is on about: the mission of bringing the Good News of Jesus Christ to our sometimes frightened and fragile world.
The task of the Vocations Office is to facilitate God’s call to a most extraordinary mission. This is not an imaginary mission, but rather one which is absolutely necessary for the future of the Church. Pope John Paul II wrote in his encyclical Ecclesia de Eucharistia that “the Church draws Her life from the Eucharist;” indeed the Eucharist makes the Church. There can be no Eucharist without a priest, however, and therefore no Church without the priesthood. Likewise in Ecclesia in Oceania John Paul II spoke of the urgent responsibility of every Catholic community to promote priestly and religious vocations at all levels - diocesan, parish, school and family (cf. 48). Pope Benedict reminds us that “we must never lose the conviction that Christ continues to raise up men, who, like the apostles, abandoning every other occupation, dedicate themselves totally to the celebration of the sacred mysteries, to the preaching of the Gospel, and to pastoral ministry.”
Imagine the difference if every person in the Archdiocese were to make a commitment to pray for vocations, especially vocations to the diocesan priesthood for the Archdiocese of Melbourne. On Good Shepherd Sunday we have the opportunity to do just that.
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