Today’s Gospel produces alternating responses from me. On the one hand I feel self-righteous frustration, looking at the times my own faith tradition has prioritized ritual purity over true caritas—love, charity. On the other hand I find this reading personally terrifying. It calls to mind lyrics by the artist Brandi Carlile who sings “But nothing scares me more / than the stranger at my door / who I fail to give shelter, time, and worth.”

Both strains of thought are worth deeper consideration. It is important to challenge the faith tradition I love so deeply, and to challenge myself as well. However I don’t believe either self-righteousness or fear are the holy responses God wants to elicit from me. So what do you want, Lord?

I brought this prayerful question to an 8 minute youtube video about nomadic shepherds doing the work of separating goats from sheep. Two things struck me as I put this video in conversation with today’s Gospel. 1. The first method used to separate the bulk of the animals seems to be different calls or sounds. Goats followed one sound and sheep followed another. This gets most of them where they need to be. 2. There were always some that needed to be physically picked up and walked over to their correct group.

My takeaway from the first observation is this: know the call. For me, for Christians, this means getting increasingly familiar with Jesus’ voice and learning to recognize it in contrast to other voices. Jesus’ voice calls towards a deepening of faith, hope and love. It is a voice that calls towards the corporal (embodied) works of mercy: feeding, giving drink, providing clothing, caring for and visiting the isolated. Sometimes I have to strain the ears of my hearts to hear the familiar call in the particularities of my own life. What does it look like for me, here and now? In Ignatian Spirituality we call this discernment. It helps me practice differentiating one voice from another in a world that pulls me in many directions. This is I believe what Pope Francis is calling the entire Church to do in the process of synodality. He has asked the whole Church to listen intently for the voice of the shepherd in our lives and in our community, and to try to distinguish it from the other voices of the world, not just as individuals but as the Body of Christ.

My takeaway from the second observation is this: trust the shepherd. There are times when I do not listen well. There are times when we as a community do not listen well. I might be running full speed in one direction only to be plucked up by the shepherd and reoriented because I have been following the wrong sound. Sheep do not appear to be happy about being picked up out of a herd of goats and carried in another direction. They squawk and wrestle; they are pretty sure they were already where they needed to be. It takes humility to let myself be reoriented, to acknowledge that I have gotten turned around and followed the wrong voice. Like everything else, this is true for me and for the broad community of faith. We don’t like being wrong. But we trust the shepherd to help get us back on track, even if it means a full 180 degree turn.
Rather than self-righteousness and fear, this gospel ultimately calls me to listen, discern and trust. The better acquainted I become with the voice of the Lord the easier this will be, for me and for us.