Cor Ad Cor Loquitor: Homily for Good Shepherd Sunday

I am the good shepherd, says the Lord;
I know my sheep, and mine know me.

and the sheep hear his voice,
as the shepherd calls his own sheep by name and leads them out.
… and the sheep follow him,
because they recognize his voice.

My dear brothers and sisters in Our Lord Christ Jesus, today, the fourth Sunday of Easter, we celebrate Good Shepherd Sunday, and these verses I just recalled, first from the Gospel acclamation and subsequently from the Gospel, offer us great insights into the heart of the Good Shepherd.

The sheep recognize his voice. How do they recognize his voice? St. John Henry Newman’s motto provides the answer: Cor ad cor loquitor; heart speaks to heart. His sheep, hear Him, because there is a resonance of His voice in their hearts. This is to say, their hearts start vibrating to the same pitch as that of His voice. This motto is relevant because it resonates with the response of the crowd to St. Peter’s words in the first reading from the Acts of the Apostles:

Now when they heard this, they were cut to the heart

It is to our hearts that the voice of the Good Shepherd is directed, my dear brothers and sisters, and his voice is directed towards all of us Christians, and to every single person in the world. He speaks to us through His apostles, and His people, who were, and are, charged with proclaiming the Good News to all the earth. Blessed are those who hear this news, who hear His voice, and whose hearts are moved, whose hearts are cut, so that they accept baptism into the faith, and practice the spiritual and corporeal acts of mercy of our faith.

Resonance, my dear brothers and sisters, is manifest when one object responds to a vibration in the other by vibrating similarly. That the life of virtue would allow one’s heart to resonate when called by the Good Shepherd should not be strange. “I am the Good Shepherd” in the Greek original reads:

              Egō eimi ho poimēn ho kalos

The word kalos could translate to good, but it could also translate to noble or beautiful. The Good Shepherd is simultaneously the noble and beautiful shepherd. If our lives are already marked by the practice of beauty or nobility, it is logical that our hearts will resonate with that of the Noble and Beautiful Shepherd.

It needs to be pointed out, my dear brothers and sisters, that Christianity does not have a monopoly on virtuous living. It was possible for the crowd that St. Peter addressed to be cut to the heart because they were following the law of Moses. Similarly, the pagans themselves knew the virtues and many tried to follow them. God speaks to all peoples in every age and gives them the tools necessary – beauty, virtue, nobility – so that their heart may resonate when they hear the proclamation of the Gospel.

A life of virtue alone, however, is not enough to get to heaven, and to avoid eternal death. It is only through baptism and through this baptism becoming worthy to consume His flesh that we can enter heaven. But a life spent in the practice of virtue does allow us to respond to the call of the Good Shepherd.

But what of those who hear His voice, preached through his missionaries, through Christians at work in their daily lives, and yet choose not to respond, not to be baptised. What of these people?

Once again, the voice of St. Peter offers us insight: they choose to remain with the “wicked generation.” And because they choose to do so, be sure that these people cannot enter into eternal life, for these are the words of the Master:

I am the gate.
Whoever enters through me will be saved,
and will come in and go out and find pasture.

Those who do not enter through this gate, those who do not accept baptism do not receive the reward of the salvation. They cannot receive salvation because it makes no sense that Our Lord suffered and died so that salvation may be gained, that He asks that we be baptized in the healing waters He provides, and we reject this path to eternal life.

Beloved brothers, let us set out for these pastures which are the spiritual joys of heaven. There those who respond to the call of the Good Shepherd, look upon the face of God with unclouded vision and feast at the banquet of life for ever more.

(A version of this homily was first preached to the faithful at the Cathedral parish of St. Catherine of Alexandria, Old Goa on 26 April 2026.)

(Image reference: Christ the Good Shepherd (mosaic detail), anonymous artist, Basilica San Lorenzo fuori le mura, Rome.)