Institutional thinking has no comprehension of personal loyalty. Fierce loyalty. The kind you don’t get to choose. The kind you are born under. Like someone in Luke born under the authority of Zacharias. That someone doesn’t get to choose another priest any more than a sheep could a shepherd; or a slave their patrician; or a Bedouin their sheikh. But in the institutionalized west, the community is a structure built around the idea that fierce personal loyalty to a tribal chief is dysfunctional. 

If the word community is supposed to have any connection to the biblical function “flock,” then our so-called communities are no communities because there is no possibility of a flock without a shepherd. Moreover, if the sheep are not fiercely loyal to that shepherd, they cease functioning as a flock. 

In Luke 1, that fierce loyalty remains necessary for the biblical function “shepherd-of-flock” with a tiny adjustment; when Zacharias opens his mouth to speak, someone else calls the shots. 

That, my friends, is the meaning of John’s name.  

Richard and Fr. Marc discuss Luke 1:64-66
Episode 448; Luke 1: 64-66

The following music was used for this media project:
Music: Birds From The East by German Tretyakov
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/9798-birds-from-the-east
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license
Artist website: https://vk.com/ganus612germantretyakov