Jesus: The Good Shepherd with a Heart Full of Love

Today we celebrate the Feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, a heart that is full of love for all of humanity. Today’s readings, Ez 34: 11-16 and Luke 15: 3-7, speak to us about God as our shepherd.  We are  the sheep of God’s flock.  The Lord claims us as His own.    “I myself,” God tells us through the prophet Ezekiel, “ will look after and tend my sheep.   As a shepherd tends his flock when he finds himself among his scattered sheep, so will I tend my sheep.  I will rescue them from every place where they were scattered when it was cloudy and dark….I will pasture my sheep; I myself will give them rest, says the Lord God. The lost I will seek out, the strayed I will bring back, the injured I will bind up, the sick I will heal, but the sleek and the strong I will destroy, shepherding them rightly.”

Who am I in Jesus’ flock? Am I injured  or sickened by sin and selfishness, by pride and lust, by arrogance and abuse of power, by rejection and  hatred (my own or that of others)?  Am I in the dark, confused by what I see around me and hear on the news each night? Have I been scattered—put out to pasture in places that do not really give life or do not make me feel secure?  The Lord knows where I am and will rescue me. The Lord sees my wounds and will bind them up with love and mercy and forgiveness. Have I strayed? “The lost,” the Lord says, “I will seek out, the strayed I will bring back…”

“I tell you,…there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous people who have no need of repentance” (Luke 15:7).

Whom Am I Seeking?

“’Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you looking for?’ She thought it was the gardener and said to him, ‘Sir, if you carried him away, tell me where you laid him, and I will take him.’ Jesus said to her, ‘Mary!’ She turned and said to him in Hebrew, ‘Rabbouni,’ which means Teacher. Jesus said to her, ‘Stop holding on to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father…” (John 20: 11-18

 For whom am I looking  as I walk through “the garden” of life today? Am I looking for Jesus? Or, am I looking for myself, for power, for recognition, for dominance, for control, for superiority over others? Onto whom/what am I holding/clutching/clinging?   Am I clinging to my anger, resentments, impatience, mistrust, anxiety, pride? Am I clutching onto my will and ignoring the will of my Father in heaven. In the liturgy of the Mass today when I prayed “Hallowed be thy name; Thy Kingdom come on earth as in heaven,” did those words fall short because what I was really praying was “Hallowed be my name; my will be done on earth, not the Lord’s?

If so, then when I actually do encounter Jesus today, I will not recognize Him. I may not even hear him call me by name.  Lord, I ask for mercy and a transformed heart so that, in truth, it is You I seek, Your Way and Your will that I follow, Your Truth that I embrace and Your Voice to which I listen. I ask for these graces in Your name. Amen!

Seeking the Pearl of Great Price and the Buried Treasure

In today's Gospel, Mt 13: 44-46, Jesus says to us:  "The Kingdom of heaven is like a treasure buried in a field, which a person finds and hides again, and out of joy goes and sells all that he has and buys that field.  Again, the Kingdom of heaven is like a merchant searching for fine pearls. When...[she] finds a pearl of great price,...[she] goes and sells all that...[she] has and buys it." 

We are on a journey initiated by God, who calls us to discover "a treasure," the "pearl of great price."
St. Paul tells us, in 2 Corinthians 4:7, that we hold "this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us."  God is the buried treasure, the pearl of great price.  Every disillusionment, every disappointment in life--and there will be many--is an opportunity to discover our true treasure, the only One who does not disappoint, is not a disillusionment.  These moments of discovery can be gut-wrenching as we come face to face with things, events and  persons (ourselves included) that do not live up to our idealistic and perfectionistic expectations.  Eventually, we will face the most difficult moment of all: "parting with the last of our jealous possessions: our sense of success, our reputation for holiness, the control of our future, the control of what our future ought to be.  The excruciating pain of a good, maybe [a] very good person called to be
better!" (Stuhlmueller, Carroll, C.P. Biblical Meditations for Ordinary Time--Weeks 10-22, Paulist Press, New York/Ramsey, 1984, p. 148). 

My prayer is, quoting parts of Stuhlmueller's meditation for Wednesday of the 17th week in ordinary time, that at the end of my life I may be ready to climb "the holy mountain, free of all earthly attachments," totally God's. I ask the Lord to rescue me "from evildoers," from my "own selfishness," so that I may, at that moment, be seeking nothing else but the real treasure and the pearl of great price, willing at that moment to sell absolutely everything to be one with my Savior in mind, heart, and soul.  I also pray for the grace to be assuming this challenge in my day to day living in the here and now.