Prophets appear to have been inspired by God to see the divine plan during their signs of the times. As I reflected on some of my recent readings, I had to stop and think who might be Prophets today my life time? Pope John Paul II, Mother Teresa, Billy Graham, all come to mind. I believe we have thousands of prophets living today or who have died recently, who have proclaimed God’s word in one fashion or another. Actually, we are priests, prophets and kings ourselves, as a result of the sacraments of baptism, confirmation, and Eucharist?
As I reflect on my own life I can see where I would have a long way to go in order to be any kind of a prophet like St. Francis of Assisi, Jeremiah, Isaiah, or any of the prophets of those times. Looking at their circumstances, I am not sure I would have been as brave, persistent, and obedient. I guess that is why it is a gift to be a prophet. Now, Pope John Paul II, Mother Theresa, and Billy Graham have been prophets of our time and have charismatically inspired through Gods word, different concerns, complacency, errors, and ideas for our secular world to come out of its sanity. I am sure there are numerous others, like them who deserve the same credit; however as an illustrative example I have chosen these three.
Working with RCIA, visiting the Rescue Mission, Being a Eucharistic Minister or going to the nursing home does not make me feel like a prophet. Writing my Senator or local congressperson, sending a small donation to Catholic Relief Services does give me a sense of making an effort toward being a better prophet. I believe that is why we are priests, prophets and kings, so we can cover all these areas of ministry.
I think the purpose of a good prophet is to make his or her audience feel the guilt, pain and compassion concerning the situation. Over the past seven years I have tried to educate myself more and more with social justice and the current world situation, I have become very motivated to do what little I can to contribute to the cause of social justice. For me to be prophetic is to be moved to compassion, to stand with those who suffer and whom the world no longer cares about.
In the developing world 1.2 billion people are living below the international poverty line of earning less than $1.00 per day. It is a sin that 24,000 people die each day of hunger and hunger related causes. That is one person every 3.6 seconds who are made in the image of God and destroyed by the sins of omission. I must continue to ask, why are people starving around the world? Why is the USA, the richest nation in the world, allowing its people to live in poverty, and to be homeless in this land of opportunity?
I think I am becoming more focused as I continue to discern over the direction to take. I will need to become more focused in one direction in order to handle my personal work load and a balanced life. I only pray that the fire in my heart continues to burn so I can help in some small way to transform our unjust society and carry out my share of dignity with the Church and other Christian people, as one body in Christ to carry out our mission of priestly, prophetic and kingly people. I trust we will as Catholics, always have priests, prophets and kings in all the various ministries to hear God’s word and do God’s deeds. My obligation is to find out where I belong on this faith journey, so I can serve as a compassionate mouth piece for God in my time and place. What about you?
The Spiritual and Corporal works of mercy in today’s world may seem odd compared to their purpose of charitable mercy for the body and soul of our neighbor, which were originated and deep rooted from scripture and tradition. Do these duties and responsibilities as Christians apply today? If so, why are so many going without? Are we morally obligated while here on earth to fulfill the great commandments of loving our neighbor? It seems to be pretty much summed up in Matthew: 25:40 - and the king will say to them in reply, 'Amen, I say to you, whatever you did for one of these least brothers of mine, you did for me. Here's our to do list, based on results, we are either sheep or goats. The list starts with #1, good luck and have a blessed day!
