The Watchman

Remember the bible account of the Watchman? God appoints the prophet Ezekiel as a spiritual watchman over the house of Israel (Ez 33). His main job is to listen to God’s warnings and pass them on to the people. If Ezekiel warns the people and they do not listen, they are responsible for their own wrong choices. If Ezekiel stays quiet and fails to warn them, God holds Ezekiel responsible for their deaths.

It’s hard to know when or even if you have had an Ezekiel moment, called to speak for God rather than oneself. But an odd confluence of circumstances may be the Lord asking me to speak up.

Yesterday I was in a hurry to make an appointment that I missed. Without warning, my little car’s battery died. I waited for Triple A to come charge or replace it, and unfortunately it was the latter. A moment of frustration and powerlessness—one never really knows what can happen or even if there will be a near future.

Last night I dreamt about a curious meeting with a learned professor giving a presentation about the current confusion in the Church. I asked him, “What if people (I said “priests”) don’t do what they are supposed to do in the way they are supposed to do it?”

He replied cryptically, “you have a guardian angel” and quoted a biblical verse, Luke 13:28.

I politely nodded, filing the verse to memory, thinking it referred to the angels that watch over us. Instead, I was rattled by what I later read:

“There will be weeping there, and gnashing of teeth, when you see Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and all the prophets in the kingdom of God, but you yourselves thrown out.”

The context of this quote is when Our Lord encourages us to enter through the narrow door (Lk 13:24-28):

“Make every effort to enter through the narrow door, because many, I tell you, will try to enter and will not be able to. Once the owner of the house gets up and closes the door, you will stand outside knocking and pleading, ‘Sir, open the door for us.’

“But he will answer, ‘I don’t know you or where you come from.’

“Then you will say, ‘We ate and drank with you, and you taught in our streets.’

“But he will reply, ‘I don’t know you or where you come from. Away from me, all you evildoers!’

With all of this, I dare to speak up, if but for a moment and sheepishly. Of course we have an angel who watches over us, thank God. But we also have a conscience, which, if informed and listened to, serves as watchman: time is short! We have no way of knowing when life will end, and if it ends with separation from God, the results will be unthinkably dire, an eternity without him, forever Satan’s to enjoy. Not my words, but those of the second Person of the Blessed Trinity who is all-knowing, all-powerful, all-loving, but also perfectly just, calling us to be perfect as God is perfect.

The upshot of all this: not wanting to be caught unprepared, I went to confession this morning. As Watchman, I ask: might your conscience be calling you to do the same?