16th Sunday Year B - Homily 5

 

Homily 5 - 2018

It was Mark, the author of today’s Gospel, not Jesus, who made the observation that the Jewish crowds “were like sheep without a shepherd”. Until now, I have heard the text as a criticism of the Jewish leaders.

However, as I hear it today, in the light of recent criticisms, particularly coming from the Royal Commission into the Sexual Abuse of Children within the Church, I wonder if the simile could be extended to include the whole Church – Rome, bishops, priests and laity as well. The Commission criticized particularly the culture of clericalism affecting the Church. In doing that, it accused the bishops and priests of over-shepherding most of the adult laity and of under-shepherding the young and the vulnerable. But it also criticized the laity for behaving too much like sheep, for letting themselves, yourselves, be over-shepherded.

We can use the time to blame the obvious ones. But blaming others is too negative, and does not get us far. Rather, the Commission’s Report is a God-given opportunity for everyone in the Church to look more closely at ourselves. We are more than individuals. We are interconnected and interrelate with others within the Church as a living body – the Body of Christ. The whole Body of Christ needs you laity to think more confidently and competently in order to contribute to the Church’s life; and it needs leaders also to rethink and, where helpful, find ways of restructuring so that you can use your heads and contribute to wider consultation and decision-making.

One issue I would like to look at today particularly is that of my own personal conscience and to encourage you to look at yours. Some people speak of “following their conscience” and simply mean doing what they want. At the other end of the scale, some simply mean obeying the rules, or the commandments. That might be obedience – but it is hardly the practice of virtue.

It is interesting to take note of what Mark in today’s passage said Jesus did: “he set himself to teach them at some length”, to teach these people wandering about like “sheep without shepherds”. What did he teach them? and how did he teach them?

Surprisingly, Mark gives very little of Jesus’ teaching in his Gospel. We need to look at the Gospels of Matthew and Luke to find that out. A familiar place to start could be Matthew’s collection of Jesus’ sayings in what we call the Sermon on the Mount. There, Jesus tried to wean people off over-reliance on law and commandment. He wanted them to go deeper, to ponder on their experience and to identify the various values safeguarded by the individual virtues. He wanted them to think for themselves. What was he getting at, for example, when he said “if you are bringing your offering before the altar and there remember that your brother has something against you, leave your offering there, go and be reconciled with your brother first, and then come back and present your offering”, or “if your right hand should cause you to sin, cut it off and throw it away”, or “all you need say is ‘Yes’ if you mean yes, ‘No’ if you mean no; anything more comes from the evil one” – and so on? Elsewhere he told parables, not to answer questions, asked or unasked; not even to illustrate or provide comparisons – as similes and metaphors do. Their purpose was to raise questions, to leave them unanswered, and invite people, against the backdrop of their personal experience, to come to their own insights.

To choose well, it helps to have rules. Rules give us the theory; they enshrine the “end product”. But more important than blindly following the rule [which is simply an exercise of obedience] is to appreciate the value that the rule protects and to cultivate the virtue that puts the value into action. Over time we can gradually improve doing both. In the process we both inform and form our conscience.