In this Sunday's gospel Jesus describes himself as the Good Shepherd willing to die for his sheep (John 10:11-18). Do we care about anything as much as this? Our modern freedom allows us to decide this for ourselves. We choose how to live our lives and what to think of as important. Frank Sinatra's song "I did it my way" touches a deep chord in the modern psyche. However this freedom has come at a cost. It has been won, argues Charles Taylor (2003), by breaking loose from older moral horizons. We no longer draw strength from the social structures that maintained our parent's lives because we do not have their shared vision for society. This leads to a loss of any heroic dimension to life - we no longer have a sense of higher purpose, of something worth dying for. The answer lies both in ourselves and also in others: all of us (not just vicars!) have a vocation to live our lives in our own distinctive way and this always involves other people. When we learn to love those who are a part of our vocation, then we too become like the Good Shepherd, ready to lay down our lives for others.

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