The 34th chapter of Ezekiel is a severe condemnation of the ruling class for repeated failures of leadership. They were like selfish, incompetent shepherds, feeding themselves rather than pasturing their sheep. They neither healed the sick nor rescued the strays nor did they mount any defense from predators. “Thus says the Lord GOD: I swear I am coming against these shepherds. I will claim my sheep from them’” (34:10). Ezekiel’s condemnation is followed by a description of a Messiah, a descendant of David, who will shepherd the people rightly and establish peace in their midst. Through the Messiah, they shall know that God is with them and that they are God’s people (Ezekiel 34:30).
Ezekiel’s prophecy was fulfilled by Jesus of Nazareth, the Messiah, who said “I am the good shepherd” (John 10:11). Jesus proclaimed the kingdom of God, founded a Church, and sent the Holy Spirit to be God with us. Jesus Christ is our ruler, leader, teacher, guide and shepherd.
Given Ezekiel’s condemnations of false shepherds and given the arrival of our true shepherd, Christ, you might expect St. Ignatius Loyola to be dismissive of institutionalized religion. He often encountered selfish and incompetent clergy. St. Ignatius was jailed twice by ecclesiastical courts, and yet he remained a faithful son of the Roman Catholic Church and one of its most ardent proponents. So ardent was his fidelity that he demanded us to “put aside all judgment of our own, and keep the mind ever ready and prompt to obey in all things the true Spouse of Christ our Lord, our holy Mother, the hierarchical Church” (SpEx 353). Was St. Ignatius willfully blind to the faults of the institutional Church, or was he filled to overflowing with trust in that institution’s Founder?