LESSON: Christ's Heart Yearns for Our Friendship

My dear brothers and sisters, in this Sunday Gospel, St Mark gives us one of the most amazing phrases in his entire Gospel. "His heart was moved...". St. Mark told us this when Jesus gets off the boat and sees the crowd.

Jesus has a human heart - he took one on purpose: so that he could be close to us. He truly cares for us; he feels our needs and struggles even more deeply than we feel them ourselves. And he continually reaches out to be our leader, our light, and our strength.

When we accept these gifts, he is pleased, truly gratified. But when we reject them, he is hurt, truly stung by our ingratitude. This is the lesson of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, which has, through the centuries, confided its sorrows to certain chosen souls, like St Gertrude and St Margaret Mary Alacoque.

When we are dealing with Jesus Christ we are not dealing with an idea, a concept, a philosophical "unmoved mover," as Aristotle described God. In Christ, God has become man, someone just like us; in heaven, this very moment, he exists as a man, body and soul, and he is "preparing a place" for us in heaven (John 14:2).

Through the Holy Spirit and the Church, he extends his friendship to us, trying to draw us more fully into the indescribable joys of his own divine life, so that someday, when the time is right, we may enjoy that place he is preparing for us in heaven.

We all know this, but how deeply do we believe it? Not deeply enough, that's why the Church constantly reminds us that God urgently desires our friendship. Every human being desire to live in communion with God; only those who find Christ get to live out that communion in the form of a real, human friendship.

God Becomes a Shepherd

This is what God is talking about in today's First Reading. He's complaining about the priests and leaders of Israel in the Old Testament. Their whole mission, their whole purpose in life was to communicate to God's people this passionate, real interest that God has in our lives. But those priests and leaders were so self-centered that they failed in their mission.

They plundered and scandalized the people they were called to protect and serve. And it made God mad! "You have not cared for my sheep," he says: "but I will take care to punish your evil deeds." God is not indifferent to these self-centered priests, because he cares about his people.

He cares so much, in fact, that he finds a radical solution.

If he can't depend on these priests and leaders, who keep rebelling against him, he will do the job himself: "I myself will gather the remnants of my flock... I will raise up a righteous shoot to David, a king who will reign and govern wisely."

This is a prophecy about Jesus Christ - God himself come to dwell among us and reveal the incredible depths of God's mercy and concern for us. And then God goes on to promise that he will also appoint new shepherds who are dependable. These are the priests of the New Testament, charged with administering the sacraments.

Making Sure Others Don't Have to Fight Alone

As we continue with this Mass, our hearts should be strengthened by this reminder that Jesus hasn't abandoned us and will never abandon us. We are precious to him, his valued friends, his fellow soldiers. The battles that each one of us will have to fight this coming week, even if they seem small in the eyes of the world, are big in Christ's eyes. We matter to him, and because of that we will never have to fight alone.

But all around us there are doing just that. They are fighting to build a meaningful, fruitful life, but they are doing it alone, full of much more fear and frustration than we have to face.

They are sheep without a shepherd, and maybe they have even been wounded and frustrated by the mistakes of false shepherds. Who will lend them a hand of encouragement if not us, we who are constantly being encouraged by the eternal and infinitely wise shepherd?

Who will tell them about the Savior, the Friend who, as St Paul says in today's Second Reading, can "be their peace," if they will let him? Us: we are his messengers. If we keep the message to ourselves, we will be no better than the selfish shepherds from the First Reading.

In a few moments, Jesus will renew his commitment to us, feeding us with the bread of eternal life, the Eucharist. When we receive him into our hearts, let's thank him for his interest in us, and renew our pledge to stay always actively interested in him and in building his kingdom.

Even if these priests fall into selfishness, mediocrity, or even sinful rebellion, the sacraments will still stand. Even if a New Testament priest is in mortal sin, God still sends his grace to this people through the sacraments that that priest celebrates. As Pope Benedict XVI put it: "the efficacy of the ministry is independent of the holiness of the minister" (Letter to Priests, 16 June 2009).

Of course, that's no excuse for us priests to be mediocre and sinful, but God's faithfulness doesn't depend on our faithfulness. So, despite themselves, priests of Jesus Christ are, through God's providence and power, dependable channels through which God continues to pour out his saving grace. That's how much he cares about us.