{"id":740,"date":"2019-05-10T11:52:12","date_gmt":"2019-05-10T11:52:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sundayscriptureonline.com\/?p=740"},"modified":"2019-05-10T11:52:39","modified_gmt":"2019-05-10T11:52:39","slug":"12-may-2019-c-fourth-sunday-of-easter-reflection","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sundayscriptureonline.com\/?p=740","title":{"rendered":"12 May  2019 (C) Fourth SUNDAY of Easter Reflection"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong><em>B. Reflection &amp; Dialogue<\/em><\/strong><em>: <\/em><strong>Jesus,\nthe Good Shepherd, cares for his flock. Prayer for vocations<\/strong><em><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">1. In the present\nliturgy this Sunday is devoted to \u201cWorld Day of Prayer for Vocations\u201d. Not much\nearlier it was known as \u201cGood Shepherd Sunday\u201d. The Gospel readings for all\nthree Sundays of the three-year cycle, and the prayers for the Mass, are all\nabout this same theme, Jesus as Good Shepherd. The Gospel readings for all\nthree Sundays are from Jesus\u2019 presentation of himself as the Good Shepherd in chapter\n10 of John\u2019s Gospel. The two themes, Jesus as Good Shepherd and prayer for\nvocations, can be very fruitfully combined. The need of prayer for vocations,\nand for what particular vocations, can best be understood in the context of\nreflection on Jesus as shepherd of his faithful flock.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">2. A central\ntruth in Jesus as shepherd of his flock is that this flock and the\ninterrelation between Jesus and believers are constituted by faith in Jesus.\nWithout this faith there can be no interrelationship between Jesus and his\nflock. It is only the sheep that belong to him that listen to his voice.&nbsp; In fact, in his debate on the issue with his\nquestioners, Jesus told them that they do not believe, because they do not\nbelong to his sheep (John 10:26).&nbsp; He had\nsaid something similar when referring to himself as the true bread of life: \u201cNo\none can come to me unless he is drawn by the Father who sent me\u201d (John 6:65).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">3. Jesus, the\nGood Shepherd, stresses the truth that, given faith, no amount of persecution,\ntrials or questioning, can destroy fidelity to him. Both he and his Father will\ndefend his flock, that is, believers in him, against all attacks from outside\nand from within. The problems concerning faith in Jesus and fidelity to him\nvary from age to age. In our own day they are manifold, from prevailing doubt\nin the every existence of God to scandals and weakness in the Church.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">4. This all leads\nto the other theme of the day &#8212; prayer for vocations.&nbsp; Jesus himself has called for this \u2013- to pray\nto the Lord of the harvest to send labourers into his harvest. Prayer itself is\nan act of faith in the nature of the Church, Christ\u2019s flock.&nbsp; We should pray for vocations for all the\nneeds of the Church, for vocations to the priesthood, religious life, for lay\npeople versed in the sciences, literature, the arts and in the many callings in\nwhich response can be made to the questions and problems endangering faith\namong the flock of the Good Shepherd.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>B. Reflection &amp; Dialogue: Jesus, the Good Shepherd, cares for his flock. Prayer for vocations 1. In the present liturgy this Sunday is devoted to \u201cWorld Day of Prayer for &hellip; <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-740","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-reflections"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sundayscriptureonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/740","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sundayscriptureonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sundayscriptureonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sundayscriptureonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sundayscriptureonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=740"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/sundayscriptureonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/740\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":741,"href":"https:\/\/sundayscriptureonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/740\/revisions\/741"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sundayscriptureonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=740"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sundayscriptureonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=740"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sundayscriptureonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=740"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}