People of One Flock - through one Gate

WORD 2day - Monday, Fourth week in the Eastertide

April 22, 2023 - Acts 11: 1-18; John 10: 1-10

Jews and pagans - this week the Word will present to us how this distinction was overcome gradually after the Resurrection experience. It was not neither natural nor an easy process - it had its moments of terrible resistance and inacceptance. However, there was no other way because the Spirit of the Risen Lord was categorical - it has to be one flock of the one shepherd. 

Jesus declared that even while he was with his followers - I am the gate of the sheepfold and all the people of God have to enter through this gate. The single name given to us for our salvation as the Word reminded us yesterday - that is what Jesus meant by the metaphor of the gate of the sheepfold. I am the way to the Father, in other words, is what Jesus taught them. Children of the One Father, flock of the One Shepherd, the people of the One flock!

Today, at times when we still speak like the pre-Resurrection people: we and they, we and the others... it is so indicative of what we need to till learn, and of where we need to still grow in our maturity. Our faith is not something that differentiates or divides us from the other, but it urges us to move towards them, to embrace them, the reach out to them. This is what it means to become the Church that goes forth... and this can happen if and only if we realise we have all come to know the Father, through that one Saviour; and we are made one people, through that one Gate, the Risen Lord Jesus Christ.