Moral leadership

The image of the shepherd and the flock of the sheep that follow him, seems to be very distant and estranged from the way we think today. But what it says is very much in tune with what we really need. We all need reassurance; we all crave for leadership in the moral and authoritative sense; we all, at some time or other, suffer at the hands of those who promote themselves as our leaders and saviours but whose major interest in reality is not our well-being.

This Sunday, Jesus is presented as the ideal shepherd of his people because he lays down his life for those in his care and whom he loves so much. As the good shepherd, Jesus never sacrifices the individual for the group; instead, he is ready to leave behind the 99 and go in search of the one outcast. This is what makes Jesus the good shepherd and what distinguishes him from any other leader, be it in politics or in the Church.

As we read in the history of the Jewish people in the Scriptures, there have always existed false prophets and pseudo-messiahs who, contrary to the way of Jesus, only make people die for them. In society and the Church alike, we still have around us so many false messiahs who merely speculate over people's misery and insecurity. They just exploit people's needs and suffering for their own personal benefit.

In a culture that considers that it has come of age, we see tides of unbelievable irrationalism. Satanic trash is still pouring out of books, magazines and films. The vogue for the occult is frequently exploited. Obviously, these are only symptoms and we need to discern the underlying causes. Western culture is undergoing a dramatic crisis of confidence. Looking back at our recent past, we acknowledge that the liberal humanist contract has been broken and this has provoked irreparable damage to the Western psyche.

As George Steiner wrote long ago, probably "the return to the irrational is, first and foremost, an attempt to fill the emptiness created by the decay of religion". And further, that it is obvious "that the search for alternative realities through the use of drugs, through a dropping out from consumer society, through the manipulation of trance and ecstasy, are directly related to the hunger for the absolute".

We need orientation, guidance, and most of all, moral leadership. In this void, the image of Jesus as the good shepherd can be very powerful and reassuring.

In the second reading today, Peter reminds us of the type of shepherd Jesus is, when he writes: "through his wounds you have been healed".

Our world and our culture need to be healed, because we are like sheep gone astray, but now we hunger again to come back to the shepherd and guardian of our souls. We need to tune in again to the voice we need to hear and to follow.

Augustine asks in his Confessions: "What am I to myself but a guide to my own self-destruction?" What had seemed a great and noble journey to find God, was for Augustine a series of delays.

We live in a world of spiritual confusion no less disorienting than St Augustine's. We cannot move through the spiritual life the way we drift through the marketplace. Jesus is specific: "Anyone who enters through me will be safe".