Each year, typically during the month of September, in the Office of Readings (which is part of the Liturgy of the Hours, a.k.a. the Breviary), we reflect on the “Parable of the Shepherds” in the Book of the Prophet Ezekiel (chapter 34), and a homily by St. Augustine of Hippo (“Sermon on Pastors”). As a priest, I have always found these selections to be a good and challenging touchstone to evaluate how I am doing as a priest.
In the parable given by the Prophet Ezekiel, the Lord is chastising the religious leaders of Israel for being more concerned about taking care of themselves, and not concerned enough about taking care of the people entrusted to them. Ezekiel is writing during the time of the Babylonian Exile. Despite many warnings, the Israelites had abandoned the covenant with God. Oh, many would still pay lip-service to the religious observances, but it was just that, lip-service. They really did not have faith in God, they did not keep God as the center of their lives. Instead of having a passionate, personal relationship with God, they had reduced their relationship with God as mere religious rituals which they did not put their heart into. They thought that they could handle things on their own, and they did not need God.
The Lord certainly holds the people responsible for their choices, but He also puts a lot of responsibility on the shoulders of the religious leaders for not having warned the people sufficiently. He notes that too often these religious leaders just told the people and the rulers what they wanted to hear. They did not challenge the people and rulers to be more faithful to God. Of course, telling the people in power what they wanted to hear assured the priests that they would be given a life of comfort and leisure. This is what the Lord calls, through Ezekiel “nourishing themselves and not the sheep.”
St. Augustine takes up this theme in his sermon, which seems to have been directed to a group of priests – maybe the priests in his diocese, or the priests in the monastery where he lived. The sermon is a powerful reminder of what priests are called to do. The ministerial priesthood is for the service of the priesthood of the baptized. By providing the sacraments, edifying homilies, and good example, the ministerial priesthood provides the priesthood of all the baptized with what they need to fulfill their mission – to take the Good News to all the ends of the earth.
This year, reading the selections from Ezekiel and St. Augustine has been particularly poignant as the Church has been painfully going through the crisis of clergy sexual abuse and misconduct. Clearly these priests were “nourishing themselves,” giving in to their lustful feelings and desires to control and manipulate the “sheep” entrusted to their care. What they did was sinful, evil, and often criminal. The Church must in humility purge this evil from its midst, and take a long hard look at itself to see how we allowed what Pope Paul VI called the “smoke of Satan” to enter into the Church. While we are dealing with very wrong actions of men of flesh and blood, we also know that our real combat is on the supernatural plane; we are fighting demons.
Something struck me in St. Augustine’s Sermon on Pastors. While talking about how “good shepherds” must be united to the only true Good Shepherd, Jesus, St. Augustine writes, “Certainly, if there are good sheep there are also good shepherds; good sheep give rise to good shepherds.” I do not think that St. Augustine was trying to shift the blame from the shepherds to the sheep in saying this. Rather I think he is saying that there is enough blame to go around; that everyone has some responsibility for allowing the “smoke of Satan” to enter the Church.
As I prayed over that passage several thoughts came to mind. Most of these incidents of clergy sexual abuse and misconduct were in the 1960s, 70s, and 80s. It was just at that time when we have seen a lot of the “sheep” going astray. Weekly attendance at Sunday Mass has plummeted from over 80% at the start of the 1960s to less than 20% today. Only a third of American Catholics believe in the Real Presence of Jesus in the Eucharist today. There has also been a significant decline in the reverence show at Mass by those who still do come. Just look at how most of us dress for Sunday Mass – it is no longer the “Sunday Best” that I grew up wearing. Shorts, tee shirts, jeans, and sports jerseys have become the norm. While I realize that we often have other things to do on Sundays (which is also part of the problem, not really keeping the Sabbath as a day of rest), is it really too much effort to dress up for Church and then go home to change into our Eagles, Flyers, or Phillies’ shirts?
More crucial, in my humble opinion, is the moral decline that has occurred during this period. Beginning in the 1960s the Church’s teaching on the gift of human sexuality has been widely rejected. Pre-marital sex is the norm. Artificial contraception is practiced by around 80% of American Catholics – an explicit rejection of God from the most intimate aspect of our lives. Many Catholics support the efforts to redefine marriage from God’s plan of it being between a man and a woman for life.
None of this excuses the evil, sinful and criminal behavior of priests – they are the shepherds – however it seems that we have thrown open the doors not for Christ, but to allow the “smoke of Satan” to enter the Church.
Clearly the Church’s hierarchy has to take responsibility for cleaning house and reforming what is broken, but all the baptized need to re-commit themselves to engage spiritual combat against the real enemy – Satan and his demons. Our reciting the St. Michael Prayer at the end of Mass is a beginning, but our battle is far from over.