Good Leaders and Bad

AM Psalm 50 • PM Psalm [59, 60] or 118
Isa. 49:13-23 • Gal. 3:1-14 • Mark 6:30-46

In our reading from St. Mark, after King Herod Agrippa murdered John the Baptist, Jesus went back to his own country to preach, and many “ran there from all the towns” to see and hear him, “for they were like sheep without a shepherd.” Many were probably running scared, worried that Herod, proving to be a tyrant like his father, might go after John's followers, too. No wonder they ran to this new prophet, having lost the comfort of their promising leader John.

People want leaders. Sadly, they often follow bad ones, as Italians and Germans did in the 1930s, as the Epiphany insurrectionists did two days before I write this reflection. We pray for good ones, now especially for Joe Biden, that he may bring peace where there are threats of war, bring love (or at least tolerance) where there is hatred, accord with our friends and reasonable negotiations with our foes, an end to racial and economic injustice, and spiritual and physical healing in this time of plague.

But that's asking too much of our new president. When he disappoints us, we should remember he's only human, like us. Meanwhile, we should look to ourselves to bring about the justice we expect from President Biden, taking inspiration from St. Francis' “Make me an instrument of your peace” prayer, and we should make it our mission to follow our one, best, and only leader, our Lord Jesus, because we are not “sheep without a shepherd.”

Written by John DuVal

This semester John is teaching a course in the Commedia of Dante, who frequently railed against tyrants and, because of his despair over the internecine violence in Italy, including the Republic of Florence, pleaded with Albert, the emperor of the Holy Roman Empire, to come down from Germany and take complete control. Well, even Dante was only human.