The Shepherd Of My Soul

by Charles J. Callan

Besides the paths and dangerous walks in the shepherd country that would lead the sheep to destruction and death, there are other paths all encompassed with evils through which, nevertheless, they are at times obliged to make their way. Safety from all harm there cannot be for the shepherd's flock. They must in their journeys encounter many perils, even while pursuing the proper paths. There are deep and darksome valleys, walled round on all sides by towering rocky hills, which at times the shepherd cannot easily escape. And within these shadowy valleys and somber ravines there dwell not infrequently wild and ferocious animals that will, if aroused, attack and kill the tender sheep. The utmost [pg 094] care and caution of the shepherd are called into service safely to conduct his dependent flock through these places of deepest peril. But in spite of all his watchfulness it sometimes happens that a wolf will get into the very midst of the sheep. The timid, terrified animals become wild with fright, and are scattered, running this way and that, until the shepherd calls and bids them collect together. No sooner do they hear his voice, than they all rush swiftly together in a solid mass, and either drive the enemy from their midst or cripple and crush him to death.

Thus in times of greatest peril the shepherd protects his sheep, and wrests them from the jaws of harm. The sheep know this, and they fear no evils; they know that their master is with them. Yea, though they walk in the shadow of perils and dwell in the midst of the valley of death, they faint not, neither do they fear, for they know that the shepherd is near.

The case of the sheep in the valley of perils is not unlike our own in the midst of the evils of the world; and the peace and safety which we enjoy should be similar also to theirs. We are assured, first of all, by an unflinching faith in God and our Redeemer that, if we trust our Master and obey Him, we shall be led aright throughout our lives, even to the kingdom of Heaven. We shall be led in the paths of justice and love, and crowned at length with the crown of glory, if we but follow the voice of our Shepherd-King, and avoid the walks of disaster and ruin. And to hear His voice and to know it we have but to listen to the teachings of His Church, which will hush to silence our troubled hearts, and direct our wayward feet into the paths of heavenly peace.

But, like the shepherd's flock, we have to avoid in our journey through life, as perils to our safety and spiritual welfare, not only the false shepherds and teachers and doctrines [pg 096] that surround us on all sides; but we must also, to pass to our reward, actually encounter inevitable evils and fight many necessary battles. Many of the paths of life through which we must of necessity pass are hard and difficult, and full of deadly perils. We must remember that sin has ruined the primeval beauty of our earthly habitation and made our life here below a labor and a toil to the end.

We not only come into the world with sin on our souls, and are thereby exiles from the city of God, but even when our sin is forgiven us the remains of the malady continue as wounds in our nature as long as we live on earth. The deadly guilt is wiped away, but the effects of the evil remain. And it is chiefly these wounds of our nature, in ourselves and in others, that render life's journey, even when pursued in accordance with the law of God, at times truly difficult and perilous. Fidelity to God and to His law is not always a safeguard against the [pg 097] wickedness of the world and of men; at times, in fact, it is just the contrary. Indeed, is it not a truth that many, perhaps the majority, of those who endeavor sincerely to please and to serve God must often suffer severely for their very goodness and faithfulness? Are they not misunderstood, and criticised, and censured? Are they not frequently accused of all manner of wrong, their work disparaged, and their motives impugned? Are not persecution, and even martyrdom, often their portion? Now all this is the result of sin. Those who call into question the deeds and motives of God's saints; those who upbraid, and criticise, and impute evil to the sincere, faithful servants of God, inflicting upon them dire evils, are but showing the effects of sin in themselves, are but giving exercise to the evil that rules within them. Their particular acts and words may be without present malice, they may be inwardly persuaded that in reviling and condemning their neighbor and doing [pg 098] him harm, they are rendering a service to God Himself; but in so doing they but manifest the effects of earlier sin, personal, perhaps, and original, which has darkened their understanding and made perverse their moral vision, so that, having eyes, they see not, having ears, they hear not, neither do they understand.[35] Following the corruption of their own nature, bleeding from the wounds of original sin, they are prone to blaspheme whatsoever they fail to comprehend;[36] and thus it is that they often make life and the world for the servant of God a truly perilous sojourn, a veritable valley of death.

This failure to be understood, this misjudgment of actions, motives, deeds, are doubtless common evils from which, in a measure, we all must suffer. But it is also true that the more elevated the life, the higher its aims, the loftier the spiritual level [pg 099] on which it proceeds, the greater the difficulty of its being understood and appreciated by the majority, who always tread the common paths of mediocrity. A saint is nearly always a disturbance to his immediate surroundings, he is frequently an annoyance and an irritation to the little circle in which his external life is cast, simply because he really lives and moves in a sphere which the ordinary life cannot grasp. Like a brilliant, dazzling light that obscures the lesser luminaries, and is therefore odious to them, the man of God is frequently a disturber to the worldly peace of common men, his life and works are a living reproach to their life and works; and hence, without willing it, he becomes a menace to their society and is not welcome in their company. Worldly, plotting minds cannot understand the spiritual and the holy; sinful souls are out of harmony with the virtuous; the children of darkness cannot find peace with the children of light. And not only [pg 100] is there a lack of sympathy in the worldly-minded for the men and women who are led of God, but there is often positive hatred for them—a hatred which spends itself in actual, persistent persecution. To be devout, to refrain from sinful words and sinful deeds, to shun the vain and dangerous amusements of worldlings, to attend much to prayer and recollection, to love the house and worship of God, to be seen often approaching the sacraments and partaking of the bread of life at the communion rail—even these holy acts are sufficient frequently to draw down on the servants of God the curse and persecution of a world which knows not what it does.

And that which happens individually to the faithful children of God takes place on a larger scale with respect to God's Church. The children of this world, those who have set their heart on temporal things, or who, through wilful error have deviated from the right path to things eternal, never cease [pg 101] from pursuing and persecuting the Church of God. They hate the Church and attack it unceasingly. Like the perverse and blinded Jews of old who reviled the Saviour and His words and deeds, who pursued Him and put Him to death, these ever-living and ever-active enemies of light and truth never abate in their fury against the chosen friends of Christ, and against His holy Church. But need we be surprised at this? Was it not foretold? Did not our blessed Shepherd, speaking in the beginning to His little flock, warn them that men would deliver them up in councils and scourge them? Did He not say to them plainly, “And you shall be hated by all men for my name's sake; but he that shall persevere unto the end, he shall be saved. And when they persecute you in this city, flee into another.... The disciple is not above the master, nor the servant above his lord. It is enough for the disciple that he be as his master, and the servant as his lord. [pg 102] If they have called the good man of the house Beelzebub, how much more them of his household.”[37]

It happens, therefore, that fidelity to God, and careful adherence to the paths of justice and holiness, can frequently be the occasion of perils and sufferings for us individually, as they also are the excuse for a vaster persecution of the Church in general. All holy persons and holy things are signs of contradiction. They are not of the world, they do not fit in with it; and between them and the world there will be strife and contention until the renovation comes.

But the enemies that lie along the ways of life, that beset and threaten even the most righteous paths of our pilgrimage, are not all from without—the most numerous and menacing are perhaps from within. “The enemies of a man,” says the inspired writer, “are those of his own household.”[38] That [pg 103] is to say, the most potent evils which we suffer, the chiefest foes to our present and future welfare are from ourselves—our own waywardness, our tendencies to evil, our wilfulness, our self-love and self-seeking, our own sins. It is from these and like causes that we suffer most. Hard and trying it surely is to bear persecutions and contradictions from others; severe is the strain to nature when, in the face of our noblest efforts, proceeding from noblest motives, we meet with misunderstanding and even condemnation; but to the upright, religious heart that is sincerely and truly seeking God amid the shadows and pitfalls of life, the sorest of all trials and the fiercest of all enemies are one's own temptations and passions and inclinations to evil. Easier it were to conquer the whole external world of foes, than to reign supreme over the little world within. Of Alexander the Great it is said, that while he actually subdued the whole known world of his time, he nevertheless [pg 104] yielded in defeat before his own passions. He could overcome his external enemies, but surrendered miserably in the battle with self.

This, then, is our greatest warfare, the struggle with ourselves; and this our greatest victory, a triumph over self. “If each year,” says the Imitation, “we could uproot but one evil inclination, how soon we should be perfect men!”[39] But it is not for us to be free from enemies and perils, both from without and from within, during our earthly sojourn. They are a part of our lot here below, they are necessarily bound up with the darkened regions through which the Shepherd must lead his flock; and hence, entire safety there shall never be before the journey's end, until we say farewell to present woes, and hail “the happy fields, where joy forever dwells.”