May 12, 2014 Monday,
5th Week of Easter
St. Nereus and Achilleus
1st Reading: Acts 11:1–18
Gospel: Jn 10:11–18
Jesus said, “I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd gives his life for the sheep. Not so the hired hand or any other person who is not the shepherd and to whom the sheep do not belong. They abandon the sheep as soon as they see the wolf coming; then the wolf snatches and scatters the sheep. This is because the hired hand works for pay and cares nothing for the sheep.“I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, as the Father knows me and I know the Father. Because of this I give my life for my sheep.“I have other sheep that are not of this fold. These I have to lead as well, and they shall listen to my voice. Then there will be one flock since there is one Shepherd. The Father loves me because I lay down my life in order to take it up again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down freely. It is mine to lay down and to take up again: this mission I received from my Father.”
D@iGITAL-EXPERIENCE
(Daily Gospel in the Assimilated Life Experience)
Without strict monitoring, caretakers of one’s poultry business can easily justify losses by saying that this and that number of chickens died of sickness. A friend had devised a repugnant strategy that included asking the caretaker to exhume the dead chickens to establish proof of their natural death.
The same dishonesty can happen in the care of sheep. In Palestine most owners required from their hired shepherds proof of death of a sheep by presenting part of its body. Even if they alleged that the sheep was devoured by a wild animal they still had to establish proof they had tried to save the sheep by showing at least part of its leg. This strategy made hired shepherds honest but did not make necessarily make them more loving. Jesus perfected the image of the good shepherd. “Like a shepherd he feeds his flock; in his arms he gathers the lambs, carrying them in his bosom, and leading the ewes with care” (Isaiah 40:11). He feels compassion for the people because he sees them “as sheep without a shepherd” (Matthew 9:36); Peter calls Jesus “the shepherd of our souls” (1 Peter 2:25) and the Letter to the Hebrews speaks of him as “the great shepherd of the sheep” (Hebrews 13:20).
Despite the strategy that my friend employed in monitoring his chickens he had to chicken out from the business. He understood that businesses like his cannot be entrusted to caretakers no matter how reliable. God entrusted his sheep to no hired care-takers but to Jesus, his only Son. That’s how ‘hands-on’ God is in the economy of salvation! – Rev. Fr. Dan Domingo P. delos Angeles, Jr., DM. Email: dan.delosangeles@gmail.com. Website: www.frdan.org.
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