By Richard Clifford, S.J.
God’s call to Isaiah and to the apostle Peter led both of them to feel acutely they were unworthy. Isaiah reacted immediately, “Woe is me, I am doomed! For I am a man of unclean lips, living among a people of unclean lips.” So did Peter, “Leave me, Lord. I am a sinful man.” Yet God accepted their situation and operated through their weakness. Isaiah’s unclean lips were burned clean by an ember, and Peter the fisherman heard the words, “Do not be afraid. From now on you will be catching people.”
How the two men reacted further is significant. Isaiah’s first words are, “Here I am, send me,” and he goes out to prepare the people to ready themselves for God’s visitation. Peter reacts by acting rather than speaking. He and his fellow fishermen “brought their boat to land, left everything, and became his followers.”
The call to both is not so much to be somebody as to do something. Isaiah is told to convey to his hearers what he has heard from God. He is “sent.” Peter is invited to follow Jesus and told that he will become a fisher of people. Their vocation is not a declaration of a special status. It is a call to a task. Pope Francis’s criticism of “clericalism” follows that same line. A cleric should not define himself by his new status, and expect to be given honor. Though one can be personally transformed by one’s call, the call itself is to perform a service for God and for others.
It’s as if God had said, “Yes, I know you’re not perfect. I’m not interested in that. I’m interested in having my love shared with the world. In a world where everyone is the object of my love and everyone is imperfect, I am calling you to do something special for me. I just need you.
Catholics tend to identify the word “vocation” with a particular kind of response to God’s call: priesthood or religious life. But these are not really vocations, but ways of living the vocation each Christian has by virtue of their baptism. In our Baptism, we said in effect, “Here I am, send me.” We left our old life behind to follow Jesus. Baptism is an answer to a call; even thought we might not fully really realize when we were baptized.
Like Peter, I am unworthy. Like Isaiah, I live among an unclean people. That’s not important. What is important is that God has called me. I know I am unworthy, that, God knows that. The people to whom God wants me to go either know that already or will soon enough. But the important point is that God has called me to share his love with everyone.
Richard Clifford, S.J. former President of the Weston Jesuit School of Theology and Founding Dean of the Boston College Clough School of Theology and Ministry