All We Like Sheep
Sheep have a very bad reputation for being dumb. They wander around the pasture, mindlessly chewing on the grass they walk on, with not a thought in the world for anything else. We sheer them every now and again for their wool, and eventually, we kill them for their meat. Not a particularly fulfilling existence on the face of it, although it’s true they do provide their shepherds with food and clothing. They seem happy enough, but let’s face it, it’s not a life we’d like to exchange for our own.
And yet, our blessed Lord compares us to these dumb beasts of the sheepfold. Obviously, not to insult our intelligence, but rather to make a comparison between a specific aspect of our nature. Our Lord the Good Shepherd echoes the words of Psalm 94, that “he is the Lord our God and we are his people, and the sheep of his pasture.” The comparison is in the relationship between God on the one hand, and we his lowly creatures on the other. The chasm between us is infinite, in the same way that the irrational beasts of the field are so far separated from the rational human being who takes care of them. We are like sheep in the simple trust we have in our shepherd, in our reliance on him to provide for all our needs.
We must not take our Lord’s analogy as some kind of encouragement to behave without thinking. While we may act like sheep in our humble faith in our shepherd, our Lord does not expect us to act without thinking in other matters. We were created to be above the animals, our reason, our intellect, immortal soul placing us far above sheep. And God expects us to behave accordingly, using our reason to determine our course of actions, notwithstanding our total reliance on Divine Providence. Let’s remember that God helps those who help themselves, and woe betide us if we presume that God’s providence will force us into heaven against our will.
When our Lord established his Church, he made Peter the first Pope, his first Vicar on earth. Since then, our Lord’s role of Good Shepherd was meant to be carried out by St. Peter and his successors. This has worked out fairly well throughout the years, and the sheep within the safe walls of the Catholic Church have been guided and protected from the errors and moral dangers presented by the world outside. If this has resulted in complacency on the part of Christ’s sheep, there arose after Vatican II a necessity to dismiss this self-indulgent reliance on the men who led them.
In the 1960s, our shepherd was struck and the sheep were scattered. As the Prophet Isaiah predicted, “All we like sheep have gone astray, every one to his own way.” And there are many ways to wander, all with different names—progressives, conservatives, traditionalists, sedevacantists—there’s something for everyone it seems. And yet the one thing we seek is missing. Unity. Everyone is seeking truth, but as Pontius Pilate said, “What is truth?” These words were ironic and appalling, coming as they did from a man who stood in the very presence of Truth himself and did not recognize him. To be a Catholic is to be a member of the Mystical Body of Christ. It is, therefore, to be united in the one Truth of that Mystical Body of Christ, to believe that Truth. Without the uniting force of a pastor, however, we drift away in every direction from the Truth, and the Good Shepherd is today busier than ever seeking out his lost sheep and bringing them back to that truth. Let’s make sure we recognize him in whatever form he takes, divine or human. If we can find a truly good shepherd of our souls, let’s abandon whatever individual whims are leading us, and acknowledge the perfect truth when we hear it. The Good Shepherd knows his sheep. Let’s make sure we know him.