I can’t believe I have agreed to this, but I am supposed to be leading the Ordination Retreat in Connor Diocese over a weekend in June, and then preaching at the Ordination Service on the Sunday! In fact, I don’t think I ever actually agreed to it at all, but somehow my name is down!

So, I thought I would try out on you the overall theme of the retreat which I was going to entitle, “Who do you think you are?” Please feel free to come back to me on this; helpful criticism is always welcome! And I was going to split it into three so-called ‘addresses’, “Who do you think you are...as a Pastor, as a Priest, as a Person?”

Ordination in the Anglican Church is all about becoming a pastor and priest. It is what we are ordained to do! ‘Pastoring’ (if there is such a word) is what this Sunday is all about. It is what used to be called ‘Good Shepherd Sunday’, wasn’t it the Second Sunday after Easter? In a sense the ‘Priest’ bit of it is what happens here in the Church building and the ‘Pastor’ bit is what happens outside of this Church building. Yet they are not separate entities; they are closely knit together.

When our Bishop came to us during Holy Week, he wondered whether he should bring his Crozier, his Crook.

I suggested that as our Father in God, absolutely he should bring it, because it reminds us of his most important role, as the Chief Pastor of the Diocese; the Shepherd who would risk his life to rescue his flock with his crook.

Our Gospel reading says this morning, “The man who enters by the gate is the shepherd of his sheep...and the sheep listen to his voice. He calls his sheep by name and leads them out. When he has brought out all his own, he goes ahead of them, and his sheep follow him because they know his voice.”

It has been said that Norfolk folk in England are not known for their adaptability. A previous Bishop of Norwich was told the only way to lead the people of his Diocese was to find out first which way they were going and then walk in front of them.

The question of pastoring and especially being a chief pastor always raises the question of leadership in the church, and indeed outside of the Church. That little story of the Bishop of Norwich is a take on the true saying of Mahatma Ghandi who once said (and I’ve used it before) “My people are on the move and I must go ahead of them because I am their leader”.

It’s all a question of who are you going to follow! At least you have a choice. I know at our ordination we promised to “reverently obey” the Bishop, but at the end of the day we can always just say “no”! What is he going to do, arrest us?

I’m sure you have been watching the progress of the Olympic Torch and the accompanying disruptions!

In 2001, the Vice President of the Beijing Olympic Bid Committee said that allowing Beijing to host the Games would “help the development of human rights”. According to an Amnesty International Report, seven years on, China’s human rights record shows little sign of improvement. I certainly do not think that the Games should be boycotted, but what the events of recent days are highlighting is the apparent disregard for human rights by China, whether it is in Tibet or inside the People’s Republic of China; a one party state under the leadership of the Chinese Communist Party.

I could be corrected on this one, but I think it was actually Napoleon Bonaparte who first coined the phrase about China being a sleeping giant. Well, the giant is wakening up and it seems to be taking over everything. I have heard that there are still over two hundred people in prison in China from a series of demonstrations for democratic reform across the country, but which centred on Tiananmen Square in 1989! To everyone else it is referred to as the Tiananmen Square Massacre, but in China it is referred to as the Fourth June Incident. The reported deaths range from 200 to 3,000.

But I don’t mean this sermon to be about China or indeed the Olympic Games, it’s about choices and leadership. We are so used to a freedom in the Western World that we follow whom we want to follow.

We follow the Good Shepherd out of love! He cannot force us to love him, because then it wouldn’t be love. He hasn’t made us into robots ordered to love him because then it wouldn’t be love.

If you ever saw the film ‘Bruce Almighty’, Jim Carey is given God’s powers, and in one scene he is pleading for Jennifer Anniston to love him! And he can’t make her!

So, it is our decision! We follow the Good Shepherd because we know his voice, he knows us by name and he loves us with an unconditional love. How can anything compare with that?