11th Sunday in Ordinary Time
“The harvest is abundant, but the laborers are few.” How often have we heard this quote?! Is there a vocation poster anywhere that doesn’t use it? It’s almost a cliché. I think that, if we’re to get the true message of this teaching, we would do well to detach it from vocation posters that evoke sad and disheartening reactions. What’s going to happen to the Church when there aren’t any priests left? There aren’t enough religious to run the few Catholic schools we have left! I want to change directions and look at the Gospel message through another lens.
Thirty years ago, I went to Corsica to visit friends and almost drowned on my first day there. I was flown to the hospital in Ajaccio, where I spent the night hooked up to an IV drip of antibiotics. My roommate was an elderly Corsican with a heart problem. My friends told him I was a priest.
We spoke a lot after my friends left – he in French, I in a French equivalent of “See Spot run.” Eventually, he shared some problems he had with the Church. I had some problems, too. We talked about praying and what we got out of it. After my friends drove me back to their home the next day, they told me that the Corsican said he was returning to the Church.
Today’s Gospel ends with Jesus telling the twelve apostles. “Cure the sick, raise the dead, cleanse lepers, drive out demons!” What does “the harvest is abundant, but the laborers are few” mean? It means stop worrying. Get out there. Every day offers opportunities to let Jesus preach and teach through us, to the young, the old, the hospitalized, the healthy – even to people who don’t speak our language. Jesus is screaming, “The kingdom of God is at hand.” Let’s cry out with him.
Prayer:
Heavenly Father, guide me as I take up the ministry of your Son. Strengthen my trust in him so that I may readily respond to the cries of the human family.
