The Good Shepherd: a new sonnet

an early depiction of Christ the Good shepherd from a mosaic in Ravenna

This Sunday, the Fourth Sunday of Easter, the Gospel set in the Lectionary is John 10:22-30, which contains Jesus’ beautiful saying ‘My sheep hear my voice and I know they follow me, I give them eternal life and they will never perish’. These verses are in fact a continuation of verses earlier in chapter 10, in which Jesus develops the image of shepherd, and declares, in one of the seven great ‘I Am’ sayings in John, ‘I Am the good shepherd, the good shepherd gives his life for the sheep’.

Reflecting on these linked verses, prompts me to post another poem from the ‘I Am’ sequence in my forthcoming book Parable and Paradox. When I came to write this poem, I found that what came out was a cry of pain, a lament. Jesus’ picture of The Good Shepherd suddenly brought out, by sheer contrast, the dreadful images and memories of all the bad shepherding, the abuses of clerical power for sexual and other purposes of which we have all become belatedly aware and which has done so much not only to hurt all the individual victims but to cast a shadow for many people over the church as an institution and even over the gospel itself. Though the gospel in all its love and freedom is just the opposite of all that clerical abuse. But the cry of pain which forms the first half of my sonnet turns to prayer, and to a return to the true essence and understanding of the word ‘pastor’ in Jesus’ promise to be our shepherd, that Christ himself will in the end rescue and heal all those who have suffered, and especially perhaps those who have suffered at the hands of false shepherds.

(Parable and Paradox is available to order on Amazon here and in the USA and will be available from May 30th

As always you can hear me read the poem by clicking on the title or the play button)

I Am the Good Shepherd

 

John 10:11 I am the good shepherd: the good shepherd giveth his life for the sheep. 

 

When so much shepherding has gone so wrong,

So many pastors hopelessly astray,

The weak so often preyed on by the strong,

So many bruised and broken on the way,

The very name of shepherd seems besmeared,

The fold and flock themselves are torn in half,

The lambs we left to face all we have feared

Are caught between the wasters and the wolf.

 

Good Shepherd now your flock has need of you,

One finds the fold and ninety-nine are lost

Out in the darkness and the icy dew,

And no one knows how long this night will last.

Restore us; call us back to you by name,

And by your life laid down, redeem our shame.