The vocation of great leaders (Pope Francis)

   God calls, and that’s what we see in the vocation of the great leaders.  In our tradition, a mission always starts with a calling.

   During the formation process, one must purify the right intention, because nobody, not even those who discover themselves called, responds with complete integrity; the response is a mixture because we are all sinners.

   [H]e that wants to be a leader of the people of God has to give God His space; therefore to shrink, to recede into oneself with doubt, with the interior experience of darkness, of not knowing what to do, all of that ultimately is very purifying.

--Pope Francis, On Heaven and Earth, passim

Image source:  Henry Ossawa Tanner, The Good Shepherd, http://blog.baejoseph.com/2012/11/an-essay-on-psalm-23.html