ONE FOLD AND ONE SHEPHERD

A MESSAGE FOR GOOD SHEPHERD SUNDAY

It is one of the most confusing and difficult issues that we have to deal with today, the schism that has taken place within the Catholic Church since Vatican II.  We are probably tired of even thinking about the rupture in the Church’s unity, resigning ourselves to the status of victimhood:  we are victims of the modernists, victims of the freemasons, victims of faithless popes, bishops and clergy.  As victims, we dare to compare ourselves to the Lamb of God, the “lamb led to the slaughter.” Like him we resign ourselves to be “oppressed and afflicted, yet we open not our mouths: we are brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so we open not our mouths.”

“Not so,” you might say.  And indeed we have rebelled to the extent that we are here today, attending a Mass that at first glance is in defiance of the laws of the Roman Catholic Church. Of course, we justify ourselves (correctly) by pointing out that we obey the higher law, which is to preserve the faith intact, even when that Roman Catholic Church herself appears to be preaching a new and unfamiliar faith.  We may seem to be outside the “one fold” mentioned by our Lord in the gospel today. We may even give the appearance of being contemptuous of the “one shepherd” who claims to be Pope.  And yet, our motives are pure and our reasoning sincere when we deny this shepherd’s authority to betray his own sheep.

However, as right as we may be, we must never lose sight of the fact that none of this is God’s will.  While our reaction to the situation may be the only correct one, this does not excuse the situation itself.  Nor does the fact that we may rightfully point the finger of guilt at the shepherd make our own position any easier to uphold.  For we are not “The Church.” We are merely the remnants of what God wants the Church to be, the last ones to cling to Christ’s teachings, his moral imperatives, and sacramental graces.  It is not an enviable position, at least not by the world’s standards.  The only way to uphold that position is by keeping the eyes of our faith fixed on this one uplifting truth, that we who appear to be outside the fold and in defiance of its shepherd are actually the ones who have been called by God to suffer through these extraordinary times, not as the victims of circumstances, but as the chosen few who should humbly work for the preservation and restoration of all things holy.

Our role is not to lose the willpower to continue, it is not to give up the fight, thinking of ourselves as victims, lambs led to the slaughter.  On the contrary, we must rise to the task God has given us, and lead the real sheep away from the slaughter of the New Church and back to the one fold, restored to her God-willed unity in the one true faith. We are called by God not to be lambs led to the slaughter, but to lead lambs from the slaughter, not to be sheep, but shepherds.