At 3 a.m. in the lambing shed on his farm in the Irish midlands, John Connell speaks gently to a ewe in labor. “The wave of willful force doesn’t work,” he says. “It’s about calm and serene and speaking gently, and that’s generally how the thing gets accomplished, certainly on our farm.” An award-winning author, investigative journalist, and organic farmer, John has spent over a decade working with sheep. “They’re very caring, look after each other, and are more intelligent than we think,” he says. “But they can be vulnerable. If they get sick, they don’t have as big of a fight in them as, say, a cow would.” And yet, John has come to admire their quiet bravery. “I think if people would spend a little time getting to know sheep, they'd realize there’s more to them than they might first comprehend.”
For the Fourth Sunday of Easter in Year C, John reflects on the Gospel’s message of Jesus as a shepherd, who knows his sheep intimately and cares for them with great love. We invited him to Preach as part of our “culture of encounter” series, inspired by Pope Francis’ call to engage with people today—the real people we hear about in the Scriptures—rather than simply engaging with ideas. “He was the pope that spoke to me most directly,” John says. “And I feel lucky that I got to become aware of his work while learning about farming.”
Ricardo asks John what he hears Jesus saying to him when he reads, “My sheep hear my voice.” For John, Jesus is saying: “I totally understand who you are, and I want you in this flock.” That intimacy shapes his writing—and how he invites preachers to write: with heart, clarity, and “one true sentence” at a time.
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Scripture Readings for the Fourth Sunday of Easter, Year C
First Reading: Acts 13:14, 43-52
Responsorial Psalm: Ps 100:1-2, 3, 5
Second Reading: Rev 7:9, 14b-17
Gospel: Jn 10:27-30
You can find the full text of the readings here.
A Reflection for the Fourth Sunday of Easter, Year C, by John Connell
A few weeks ago now, it was lambing season on our organic mix farm in the Irish Midlands. There is something about this time of year that gives me great joy—it is a time when the mystery of life surrounds us and holds us. And, if we are lucky, we gain valuable lessons from it, not just as farmers, but as whole spiritual beings.
In the sheep barn, all things are equal. A man becomes a shepherd, and a lamb crosses over the threshold of the womb and emerges into the breathing world. Lambing season, as we call this time, is when I often give thanks in the barn to the Almighty, for this is a place of the business of life. Sheep are earthly creatures: They are born, they drink their mother’s milk, and they eat the grass. They are part of the earth song.
In today’s Gospel of John, we hear, “My sheep hear my voice; I know them, and they follow me,” and we know that the Father has given them, and in that gift, we are “one.” I like this sentiment. These sheep of mine know my voice, my face. And in the farm, as I’ve experienced it, there are times of quiet faith to be seen.
This week, the Holy Father Pope Francis passed. And there is a line from him that has always resonated with me, that we must have the “smell of the sheep” about us. That smell comes from being with the flock. Of course, Pope Francis meant this, as his ministers should be, have the smell of their congregation of real people about them. But perhaps, too, he meant something of the life of the shepherd.
When we read the Bible, when we encounter the scripture, the lives of Jesus and the disciples can seem so far removed from our modern world. But for us, farmers or shepherds, that dance has not changed so greatly in the 2000 years since the time of their writing. Animals must be born, crops must grow. We still reap from the earth and give thanks for the harvest. There is life and death in our everyday occurrence.
Three years ago, I set out on a mission. I wanted to farm 12 sheep on our family farm, and in the process, learn about life along the way. It was a sojourn into the spirit. Ultimately, the sheep were a way for me to gain a foothold in a search that had taken me across the world. In recent years, I was looking for the meaning of life. It started in a different phase. I had completed a book and was suffering from what my wife called “burnout.” I called it “soul tiredness.” I was empty and worn, and try as I did, to write and start new projects, little came. There were flits of ideas, but when it came down to it, each idea withered and died. And I found myself facing empty pages and abandoned projects.
It was at this time that John Clare, the English pastoral poet, came into my life. Clare, long dead, was someone who had written about farming life, albeit in the 1800s. It was a line that spoke of being in the cathedral of nature, of sleeping in an untroubled land where the grass was below, and the vaulted sky was above—where one could abide with one’s creator. I do not know what it was about that stanza from his poem, “I Am!,” but it moved me, stirred me, and got me thinking about the creator God. I threw away my fantasies of books and instead moved into the living sea of the family farm. It was there in that place that I slowed down a once busy life and settled into nature’s pace.
At nature’s pace, I began to think of the great tapestry of life, and the teachings the natural world can provide us. I had teachers and guides on that journey. In the barn there hangs a woodblock print of St. Francis of Assisi. In our religious life as a family, we have an affinity with St. Francis. We have a statue of him, which we take down during the lambing and calving seasons. We pray for safe births and blessings in this time. And so, in the season of birth, I often find myself saying silent or whispered prayers. When things go well on the farm, every life is a gift. There is, in the sheep and lambs, a culture of encounter. As Pope Francis puts it, we encounter the “divine spark” in the good and bad of the everyday life of farming.
When I farm, I feel myself as part of the song of the ancients. So little has changed since that time. We, the people of the land, can understand the Gospels in an intimate way. In my travels among farming peoples, from migrant farm workers in the US to small tenant farmers in Europe, I came to understand that I was meeting the people of the land. These people work in harmony with the earth, but also work in unison with the good word. They know the smell of the sheep. They know, too, what it is to be part of the great flock.
My journey in working with the sheep taught me about life. The resounding call from that sojourn into the earth was love. Love lifted all things. Love made me aware of the dance of life. St. Francis, Pope Francis, they were two men who knew this lesson, who lived this good word.
It is after Easter now, and our lambs and their mothers are out in the springtime fields. In seeing them, there is a great joy for me. The sheep and I are one. God and I are one. The lesson I learned was that we are all people of the land. One does not need to live in the countryside to hear the good word. There are shepherds and flocks from around the world, from the high rise city to the quiet hamlet. We just need to listen. We just need to have that culture of encounter. As Pope Francis said, “not seeing, but looking; not just hearing, but listening; not just passing people, but stopping with them.” I learned about the flock of life by working with my own flock. The sheep hear my voice, and now I know that the Lord does too—and so he can for you, also.
