Just a word before we go...Fourth Sunday of Easter...May 11, 2025

Jesus, in today’s gospel, tells us that his sheep know his voice and they follow him.  He will lead them to eternal life, and no one can snatch them out of his hand.  The reading from Revelation also speaks of sheep and shepherds when revealing the image of a great multitude from every nation, race, people and tongue who are led to streams of life-giving water and have every tear wiped from their faces. 

The universal nature of the shepherd’s voice, replete with promises of sustenance and eternal life, prompts the question of how and when we might hear this voice? How do we attune ourselves to be able to discern that saving voice amid all the clamor and cacophony of our daily lives?  Is it only on Sundays, or under certain circumstances?

Perhaps the universality of the call applies not only to all people and situations, but also to all time, and all the time, wherever we are and whatever we do. The call may sound clear, or it may take skill to hear; but the call remains.

We are reminded of the universality of the call this week as we welcome our new pope, Leo XIV, an American with global experience and a diverse ethnic heritage. Among his first words were these:  “God loves us, all of us, evil will not prevail. We are all in the hands of God. Without fear, united, hand in hand with God and among ourselves, we will go forward.” His words apply not only to the life of the greater Church but to our particular lives as well.

Closer to home, one amazing and profound way the shepherd calls is through you who are parents. You who have given life, sustained life and are responsible for those lives … through you, the shepherd’s voice calls loudly. What you do is holy and blessed.  But I would suggest that you are not alone in that experience. One does not have to be a parent to play a parenting role, or to be able to hear the shepherd’s voice. Universality applies here as well.

As we celebrate Mother’s Day, it seems appropriate to think about the ways in which a mother’s love (and by that I mean the love of anyone who plays a mothering role in the life of another) reflects the love of the Good Shepherd. In our life journeys we can face suffering, rejection and pain, along with all the best life can offer.  But whatever life places in our paths, our faithfulness to the call of the Good Shepherd can sustain and comfort us with assurances of  hope for our future.

In his poem “The Sun Never Says,”  Rumi, the 13th century Persian poet and mystic, paints an image of the power of a mother’s love as it reflects the love of the Good Shepherd:

“Even

after

all this time

   The Sun never says

to the earth

‘you owe me.’

    Look what happens

with a love like that,

        It lights the

 Whole

  Sky.”