Christ instituted the apostles in response to human misery. Today’s gospel tells us: “When Jesus saw the crowds, he had compassion for them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd.” This leads him to tell his disciples: “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few; pray therefore the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest.” In the face of so much need, there must be labourers sent to tend to it.
Curiously, two metaphors are working together here: humanity as helpless sheep, and humanity as a hopeful harvest. The first stresses our passivity (though not total: sheep can be very useful, producing wool, milk, meat …); the second stresses that we do have something to offer. We can be a good harvest giving forth abundant fruit. In both cases, however, we need taking care of, be it by shepherds or labourers.
And then Our Lord ‘calls to himself’, twelve apostles “and gave them authority over unclean spirits, to cast them out, and to heal every disease and every infirmity”. Or to follow Christ’s metaphors, to defend the sheep from wolves and thieves which could ravage and kill them and the harvest from diseases which could spoil it. So, the purpose of the apostles, and of the bishops as their successors, is to defend us from all that could do us spiritual harm and to enable us to achieve our full potential in Christ, that abundant harvest. It is a frightening thought that Judas, ‘who betrayed him’, became a wolf, a disease, himself. So our prayer for labourers for the harvest should not merely be for them to present themselves but for them to stay faithful to their call.
In the first reading, Moses tells the people how God ‘bore you on eagles’ wings and brought you to myself’. He tells them that if they are faithful in the land he is taking them to, they will be God’s own possession and ‘a kingdom of priests and a holy nation’. For this to happen, God has given us, in his New Covenant, bishops to be the new High Priests, as successors of the apostles, and other priests as their assistants. So, the very institution of the apostles and of bishops is for God to take us to himself and for us to become ‘a holy nation’. This is understood primarily of the Church, the new Israel, which must always strive for holiness. ‘A kingdom of priests’ certainly means ‘a kingdom with priests’, i.e. ordained ministers, but it also refers to what is called the common priesthood of the faithful. There is a priestly aspect to all our lives – the daily prayers and sacrifices we offer God in our ordinary work and life. And the ordained priests help us live out this common priesthood, particularly by giving us the sacraments and by their guidance and teaching.
Homily on the readings of the XI Sunday in Ordinary Time (A)
The priest Luis Herrera Campo offers its nanomiliaA short one-minute reflection for these Sunday readings.
