Father Rick Bolte's Homily

C: FOURTH SUNDAY OF EASTER

 “My sheep hear my voice; I know them, and they follow me.” Do we hear God’s voice? Many of us would say “no” or at least “not very often.” We imagine that God only speaks to important people in dramatic ways and therefore not to us. But our reading tells us that if we are his sheep, we hear his voice.

Perhaps we need to ask why we don’t hear his voice. Most of us don’t spend time listening (praying) because we are too busy. We are busy working building or maintaining our career. We need to bring home money for our family’s needs and wants. We’re busy caring for the house, car, etc. that we’ve bought with the money we brought home. We’re busy with the children driving them and arranging for them to have all the opportunities they need and want. We want our children to have the best we can provide. We want our children to have every opportunity we can afford to develop whatever talents and abilities they have and so be successful in their life. The list could go on.

It’s not hard to see where this is heading. If we are too busy to hear God’s voice and follow him, we follow a different god! Not intentionally but subtly we treat God as a lesser god as we strive for what really matters. Whatever we consider to “really matter” is in effect our god. God becomes relegated to some code of conduct that leads us to follow these other gods in a nice way. Nice usually translates into a way acceptable to those who know something of how we live.

This applies even to those who are busy doing good things. People very busy volunteering and doing things for others. It applies to me when I’m too busy with all I “have” to do as a priest. In our culture the god of “being busy” is considered a very admirable god.

We have good reason to create our own god. The true God calls us to grow. We resist change especially a change in values and the way we live. We like to fit in and be accepted by others. It’s much more acceptable to adopt a god who is primarily a code of behavior that we have to follow. Even if it isn’t easy, we know what we have to do and learn to pursue our god while maintaining we are following the real God. We can insist we are following the real God by pointing out our observance of the law and all the good things we do. It’s convincing to others but it is not life. To have life, to be in relationship with God, we have to listen to his voice. We have to choose God above all other gods. We need to recognize the ways other gods subtly can take the place of the real God in our lives. We need to pray – to take time to hear God’s voice.