A PROPHETIC VOCATION

I couldn’t help but wonder about the vocation of the prophet.  We’ve heard three times in one week that the crowds want to stone someone, in particular Jesus.  Jeremiah had second thoughts about the vocation, feeling duped and trapped by God. The vocation also seems to be a particularly lonely one.

Jeremiah finds he just can’t trust “All those who were [his] friends [who] are on the watch for any misstep.” (Jer 20:10) Jesus will soon be abandoned by his friends when they come to finally arrest him.  WHY?

Because Jeremiah and Jesus have faithfully proclaimed the coming of the kingdom of God only to suffer the rejection of those to whom they were sent.  At this point in the Gospel, Jesus is making perfectly clear from where he came, who he is, and the authority by which he performs his works.  In the minds of his opponents, Jesus has blasphemously made himself God (Jn 10:33) which puts stoning back on the table.

For those of us who have chosen to be in full communion with the Church; Baptized into Christ death and resurrection.  Faithfully believe in his real presence and receive his body and blood in communion and are confirmed in the fullness of the faith through confirmation.  We have accepted the vocation of priest, prophet and king.

We are to perform the works of the Father, to continue the mission of Jesus.  We know that this does not mean everything is going to be easy.  We know that so many have been wounded by the Church and struggle to trust Her.  We know that many are casting stones in hopes that our message would just be silenced.  But it just can’t be like that.  It was during such challenges that God heard both the prophet and his Son and yet God does not remove the prophetic mantle from either one, nor does he from us.  Remembering Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane and on Calvary, we see what being the Father’s Son will cost Jesus.  What it will cost us.

The motto of our Gospel proclamations must be, “as we proclaim, we must live.”  If we’re going to preach love, we must live love of all God’s creation.  If we are going to preach the hope of reconciliation, we must live forgiveness.

There is one thing we can rely as we live as out the prophetic vocation of the Church, knowing the road will be full of stones and often lonely, that “the LORD is with [us], like a mighty champion: [our] persecutors will stumble, they will not triumph.” (Jer 20:11)

We are on the brink of Holy Week: We can choose to go through it on autopilot, or we can choose to live the Gospel fully, despite stones and derision.