Dear Brothers and Sisters,

Our gospel text today has Jesus traveling throughout the towns and cities healing the sick and casting out demons. The Gospel also tells us about his emotional distress. How he is moved with pity and concern for the people. Matthew speaks of the people as ‘sheep without a shepherd’ which hearkens back to an image used by the Prophet Ezekiel to describe the lack of leadership for Israel due to the corruption of those meant to guide and care for her. In Ezekiel, chapter 34 the Prophet foretells how God would come himself to shepherd his people, uniting them under a King like David.

The disparity in the leadership even to Jesus’ day has the Lord creating a new leadership which will fill the void. To this leadership he gives full authority – a significant point. Up to this moment Jesus has been teaching, healing and exorcising demons with his followers simply being witnesses to his ministry. Now he gives them a share of this authority to do as he has shown them. He commissions and sends them forward. He calls them ‘Apostles’, ‘those who are sent’. They will exercise that power and announce to the world that the Kingdom is at hand.

All of us are sent to bring the good news to the world that Jesus’ Kingdom has come. We have been consecrated in our baptism and given the gift of the Holy Spirit. That gift was confirmed when we stood before the Bishop and professed our faith, and in that moment we were given an even greater share of that Spirit. We are a HOLY people. However, we don’t always acknowledge that or even believe that about ourselves. We think because we are flawed by sinful behavior or have failed in some way that God obviously would never choose us to be his messengers. Yet that is far from the truth. Each and every one of us is an apostle – we are sent by the Lord, every time we leave Mass, after we have been fed at the altar to go out into the world and build the Kingdom. To do what he has commissioned us to do; feed the poor, care for the sick and the imprisoned and to proclaim his name in all the places where darkness fills the world! You are called and sent – what are you waiting for?! Go and make a difference!

Peace,

Fr. Steve