December 28^th 2014.  FEAST OF THE HOLY FAMILY

GOSPEL Luke 2:22-40

­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­Translated from a homily by Don Fabio Rosini, broadcast on Vatican Radio

Don Fabio’s reflection follows the Gospel reading ...

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GOSPEL Luke 2:22-40

When the day came for them to be purified as laid down by the Law of Moses, the parents of Jesus took him up to Jerusalem to present him to the Lord — observing what stands written in the Law of the Lord: Every first-born male must be consecrated to the Lord — and also to offer in sacrifice, in accordance with what is said in the Law of the Lord, a pair of turtledoves or two young pigeons. Now in Jerusalem there was a man named Simeon. He was an upright and devout man; he looked forward to Israel’s comforting and the Holy Spirit rested on him. It had been revealed to him by the Holy Spirit that he would not see death until he had set eyes on the Christ of the Lord. Prompted by the Spirit he came to the Temple; and when the parents brought in the child Jesus to do for him what the Law required, he took him into his arms and blessed God; and he said:

‘Now, Master, you can let your servant go in peace,
just as you promised;
because my eyes have seen the salvation
which you have prepared for all the nations to see,
a light to enlighten the pagans
and the glory of your people Israel.’

As the child’s father and mother stood there wondering at the things that were being said about him, Simeon blessed them and said to Mary his mother, ‘You see this child: he is destined for the fall and for the rising of many in Israel, destined to be a sign that is rejected — and a sword will pierce your own soul too — so that the secret thoughts of many may be laid bare.’
There was a prophetess also, Anna the daughter of Phanuel, of the tribe of Asher. She was well on in years. Her days of girlhood over, she had been married for seven years before becoming a widow. She was now eighty-four years old and never left the Temple, serving God night and day with fasting and prayer. She came by just at that moment and began to praise God; and she spoke of the child to all who looked forward to the deliverance of Jerusalem.

When they had done everything the Law of the Lord required, they went back to Galilee, to their own town of Nazareth. Meanwhile the child grew to maturity, and he was filled with wisdom; and God’s favour was with him.

The Gospel of the Lord: Praise to you Lord Jesus Christ

Kieran’s summary . . . In Hebrew culture, there were various rituals by which the people consecrated the important moments of their lives to God. The point of these rituals was that they expressed the belief that God was the master of life. He gave the gift of children so it made perfect sense that the first-born child must be entrusted back to him. How often we seek to be the masters of our own lives! And when we do, we end up building consecration camps, or enacting laws that allow us to select which lives to keep and which to discard. We test the child within the womb and if we don’t like the result of the analysis, we act like God and become selectors of who is to live and who is to die. In the feast of the Presentation, Mary humbly consecrates her child to God. And, incredibly, God entrusts him back to us! As the Gospel tells us, this act of presentation is the source of a conflict in the world, the fall and ring of many. We are confronted with the choice to consecrate our lives to God, or to live in a self-referential way, depending on purely human resources. But human resources cannot break down the walls of nothingness that surround us! Only Jesus can. God brings life where it seems impossible, as in the infertility of Abraham and Sarah recounted in the first reading. This Christmas Season, let us entrust our lives to the child born in a stable who reaches down from the depths to entrust his life to us!

Jesus was born among the animals because he wanted to reach down to our very depths to lift us up to him

We approach the feast of the Holy Family in the context of the wave of joy that comes during the celebration of the Christmas season. The birth of Jesus in the stable of Bethlehem is the key for interpreting the readings of Sunday's feast. Why is it so important and urgent that the Son of God himself should become man and be born with a flesh like ours? Why couldn't God just have given us a clear list of instructions by which to live? Why couldn't we just make a greater effort to behave better? None of this was enough for God, and that is why Christmas is such a joyful time. God comes himself to live among us and raise us up. He initiates the great adventure of the union between humanity and the divinity. Immanuel - "God with us" - makes himself the least of humanity. In fact he is born in a stable among animals because there is no room for him in human society. God reaches down to the very place where mankind has dehumanised itself in order to lift it up to God. It is this union with God that makes Christmas so joyful. Life is no longer focussed on the purely biological, on the trivial issues that drive us to despair. The union of God and humanity lifts our gaze to higher things, to the wonderful dignity that we possess, and to our supernatural vocation on account of the fact that the image of God has been imprinted on us.

The first reading tells how God blesses us by doing extraordinary things, by giving life where none seems possible

These themes become concrete in the holy family. The first reading from Sunday tells how Abraham has arrived at the edge of desperation. He is old and still has no heir. But God makes him realize that what is at going on here is something of global significance, a blessing that is unfolding and that has no limits. Then the reading skips on a few chapters and we are told that Sarah in her old age conceives a child. Here, we are confronted with the great, the extraordinary, the unexpected. We cannot survive without the extraordinary! Why did the Son of God become incarnate? Because we need something exceptional that only he can give! We need to see the sterile womb becoming capable of generating life, the old age of Abraham transformed into something fertile. 

The Presentation is about consecrating life to God. When we try to be the masters of our own lives, we end up destroying the unborn, constructing concentration camps, and creating horrific situations in the world. Life belongs to God and must be entrusted to him. At the same time, God entrust his only son to us.

In this light we consider the Gospel reading, which this year describes the presentation in the Temple of Jesus. The days of purification have ended and it is time to present the first-born to the Lord. This theme is very important in the Old Testament. Life is a gift from God and the first born must be entrusted to the Lord. Rites of purification in the Hebrew tradition were rites that involved human cycles of birth, life and death. There was no sense of "dirtiness" in these rites. Instead they were held sacred because they were ways of consecrating life to God. Life was not something that we were to manage by ourselves. When we seek to manage life by ourselves, we end up constructing concentration camps. When we take it upon ourselves to decide the parameters of life, then we engage in a selection of the species, which is exactly what we are doing now. Our laws permit us to make decisions, following medical analyses, as to whether particular children are suitable for life or not. If we don't like what we see, we are free to discard the life freely. We have become the selectors of who lives or dies. When humanity grants itself the authority to manage the issues of life, we do things that are inhuman and intolerable. In the Gospel, by contrast we are confronted with a mother who humbly consecrates her child to God. But there is also a more universal dimension to the story. The mother is entrusting her child to God, whilst God at the same time is giving his son to all of humanity. 

The Presentation of Jesus causes a conflict in the world. Salvation is placed before us. Indeed, the son of God is entrusted to us. We too must consecrate ourselves to him. If we do not, then we will end up living lives that are incomplete and not even human. God is the source of real life. Without him we cannot penetrate the wall of nothingness that surrounds us.

During this Presentation scene we hear beautiful and illuminating prophecies. Jesus is to be a light for all nations and the fulfilment of the Old Testament prophecies. But at the same time, a sword will pierce the soul of Mary; the child will cause many to rise and fall. What is the source of this conflict? We will rise from dust to glory, seeing that glory has descended to the dust in Christ Jesus. But to rise from the dust it is essential that we entrust ourselves to this child who is placed before us. Our families are often precarious places, heading for shipwreck. And they are in this terrible state because they are self-referential, based purely on human resources. But human logic will not overcome the wall of nothingness that surrounds us. In order to truly discover who we are, we must penetrate this wall of nothingness, and it is only with the Lord Jesus that we can accomplish this. In order to overcome the challenges that confront the family, we must consign ourselves to Jesus, purify ourselves so that our hearts are penetrated by the sword that rids us of what is not ours. We do not come to salvation on a wing, making our way with things that are merely human. We must give ourselves over to the Lord. The Lord gives himself to us so that we might give ourselves to him. His was born in the stable of Bethlehem was so that we might start to be reborn in him, to make the essential leap away from ourselves and towards him. The presentation in the temple manifests this combat in which we must engage in order to make the leap. We belong to God. If we do not consecrate our lives to God then our lives are not even human. They are unsatisfying and incomplete. In God everything becomes holy and wonderful. But God cannot force us to give ourselves to him; we must do it ourselves just as Mary did when she consecrated her only son.

We wish a peaceful season of Christmas to everyone and a happy celebration of the incarnation of Our Lord.

December 21^st 2014.  Fourth Sunday of Advent

GOSPEL Luke 1:26-38

­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­Translated from a homily by Don Fabio Rosini, broadcast on Vatican Radio

Don Fabio’s reflection follows the Gospel reading ...

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GOSPEL Luke 1:26-38

The angel Gabriel was sent by God to a town in Galilee called Nazareth, to a virgin betrothed to a man named Joseph, of the House of David; and the virgin’s name was Mary. He went in and said to her, ‘Rejoice, so highly favoured! The Lord is with you.’

She was deeply disturbed by these words and asked herself what this greeting could mean, but the angel said to her, ‘Mary, do not be afraid; you have won God’s favour. Listen! You are to conceive and bear a son, and you must name him Jesus. He will be great and will be called Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his ancestor David; he will rule over the House of Jacob for ever and his reign will have no end.’

Mary said to the angel, ‘But how can this come about, since I am a virgin?’

‘The Holy Spirit will come upon you’ the angel answered ‘and the power of the Most High will cover you with its shadow. And so the child will be holy and will be called Son of God. Know this too: your kinswoman Elizabeth has, in her old age, herself conceived a son, and she whom people called barren is now in her sixth month, for nothing is impossible to God’.

‘I am the handmaid of the Lord,’ said Mary ‘let what you have said be done to me.’ And the angel left her.

The Gospel of the Lord: Praise to you Lord Jesus Christ

Kieran’s summary . . . In the first reading, David is so grateful to God for his many blessings that he tells the prophet Nathan that he plans to build a temple for the ark of the Lord. That night, however, Nathan, receives a message from God. David is not to build a house for God - God instead will build a house for David and make the sovereignty of his house permanent. In the Gospel, the angel Gabriel appears to Mary and announces the fulfilment of Nathan’s prophecy. The virgin is to conceive and bear a son who will take the throne of his ancestor David. Don Fabio tells us that the prophecy of Nathan is not just for David, but for all of us! David had a noble and beautiful idea, just as we have many noble and well-meaning projects. But our ideas remain merely human ideas. Only God can give life, and he always gives life virginally. In the Gospel, the incarnation of God is realized virginally. Mary provides the good soil that welcomes the seed of God, but it is only God who can generate true life. We are not the sole generators of anything good! Christmas is a time for reflecting on the fact that our task is to welcome his life when the Lord presents it to us. Our mission in our marriage, our vocation, our daily life, is not to follow our own ideas, no matter how good those ideas might seem to be. Our job is to discern what it is in our life that comes from God. Any initiatives we have must be based on the work of God in our lives. Often we expect God to bless our projects. We pray to him asking for success. We ask him to shake some holy water over the things that we own and value. This is wrong! God is not our personal chaplain who assists us in our worldly designs! The things we do will not bear permanent fruit, will not be blessed, if they do not have their origin in God. Christmas shows us that God’s work is always virginal. It always comes from him, not from us. This Christmas let us reflect on the virginal works he has sought to accomplish in us, the initiatives he has taken with us, the many times that he has sought to erupt into our lives.

God’s message to David is this: “I am the one who constructs my dwelling in the midst of humanity. I am the one who is the origin of life.” The Lord has the very same message for you and me!

Sunday’s Gospel is the account of the Annunciation. We have commented on this Gospel at various times from different perspectives. On this occasion we will look at the Gospel in the light of the first reading. The angel Gabriel tells Mary that she will give conceive a son who will be called Jesus, and the Lord God will give him the throne of his father, David. This recalls the prophecy found in the book of Samuel that we hear in the first reading. What was the original context of the prophecy? David had subdued all his enemies and had established a house that was not just a physical house but also a dynasty. David’s heart swells with gratitude for all of the unmerited blessings that the Lord has bestowed on him. He says, “How is it that I am living in a beautiful house while the ark of God dwells in a tent? It is not right that the Lord lives in conditions that are inferior to mine!” The prophet Nathan is impressed by this sentiment and encourages David to go ahead and do whatever it is that he has in mind regarding a new dwelling for the Lord.  But during the night the Lord speaks to Nathan and gives him a message for David. “David, you intend to build a house for me? Look at our relationship up to now. I have taken you from the pastures and been with you wherever you went. I have destroyed your enemies and given you a name to rank with the great on earth. I will build a house for you!” The Lord says this to David and he says the very same thing to all of us!

The story of the incarnation is the story of God’s initiative and humanity’s welcome for that initiative

What is the Annunciation all about? In our preparation for Christmas we reflect on the incarnation of Christ, the encounter between human flesh and the divinity of God. This encounter we find in the body of Jesus, in the little child who is born in Bethlehem and brings heaven down to earth. The glory that is in the highest heaven becomes peace for people on earth. Where does the inspiration for the incarnation come? From the mind of man or the mind of God? David had a beautiful project in mind, but the ideas of human beings, no matter how wonderful they are, are not the ideas of God. There is an abyss between us and God, and only God can cross that chasm. Salvation finds its point of departure in God, not in humanity. Our task is to welcome redemption when it is presented to us. The story of the angel’s announcement to a young unmarried girl is precisely this story of God taking the initiative and humanity (in the person of Mary) welcoming it.

God’s work on earth is conceived virginally. It comes purely from him. If our marriage, our vocation, our day’s work, does not find its origin in God, then it will not be life-giving, fertile, blessed

Mary conceives virginally, and this is an essential point. The life of God is always conceived virginally; it is not born from human seeds. All of God’s works in us have a virginal origin. What does this mean? When we follow our projects, it is always important to ask ourselves: “Where does the initiative for this come from?” Often we are motivated by our own impulses, and sometimes these impulses can be good, like David’s desire to build a temple for the Lord. But no matter how good our ideas are, they are always our ideas. Life comes from God’s initiative. When two young people are trying to discern whether to get married or not, they must seek to discover if there is something that is pure gift at the heart of their relationship. When a person is trying to decide if they are called to a vocation to the priesthood or religious life, they must ask themselves if their desire to give themselves to the Lord is motivated by some need of their own. If the origin of what we do is based solely on human DNA, then we cannot hope to do something that is truly good or beautiful. The essential point is this: new life is welcomed, not generated! Only God can open the heavens! At Christmas we are presented with a gift to be welcomed. It is not something that depends on our initiative, no matter how presentable and well-meaning our initiative might be.

We try to make God our chaplain. We ask him to bless our projects, to help us to have worldly success. This is wrong! We must open ourselves to God’s initiatives and welcome them, not expect him to bless ours

When our initiative is based upon gratitude, based on the work that God has done for us, then it becomes something beautiful, fertile and blessed. But when it is born from our flesh, it is a different story. That is why it is important to try to discern the true origin of the things that we do. How was Jesus born? From the generosity of God. Sometimes we expect God to be a chaplain to us. We ask him to come and bless our works, to throw some holy water on the things that are ours so that we might be assisted in bringing our own projects to a successful conclusion. How misplaced this is! Christmas is the story of God’s surprising initiative, the generation of new life within a virgin. This virgin is the good ground in which the healthy seed of God comes to life, free from the weeds and confusion that otherwise prevails. We must learn to recognize the virginal works of God in our lives, his eruption into our existence, the initiatives he takes with regard to each one of us! Virginity is neither an ethical nor a purely physical category. It is an existential category that pertains to our relationship with God. With the Lord we must live things virginally. The initiative is his, we cannot generate his life on our own.

December 14^th 2014.  Third Sunday of Advent - Gaudete Sunday

Gospel: John 1:6-8; 19-28

­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­Translated from a homily by Don Fabio Rosini, broadcast on Vatican Radio

Don Fabio’s reflection follows the Gospel reading ...

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GOSPEL John 1:6-8; 19-28

A man came, sent by God.
His name was John.
He came as a witness,
a witness to speak for the light,
so that everyone might believe through him.
He was not the light,
only a witness to speak for the light.

This is how John appeared as a witness. When the Jews sent priests and Levites from Jerusalem to ask him, ‘Who are you?’ he not only declared, but he declared quite openly, ‘I am not the Christ’. ‘Well then,’ they asked ‘are you Elijah?’ ‘I am not’ he said. ‘Are you the Prophet?’ He answered, ‘No’. So they said to him, ‘Who are you? We must take back an answer to those who sent us. What have you to say about yourself?’ So John said, ‘I am, as Isaiah prophesied:

a voice that cries in the wilderness:
Make a straight way for the Lord’.

Now these men had been sent by the Pharisees, and they put this further question to him, ‘Why are you baptising if you are not the Christ, and not Elijah, and not the prophet?’ John replied, ‘I baptise with water; but there stands among you – unknown to you – the one who is coming after me; and I am not fit to undo his sandal-strap’. This happened at Bethany, on the far side of the Jordan, where John was baptising.

The Gospel of the Lord: Praise to you Lord Jesus Christ

Kieran’s summary . . . This is Gaudete Sunday, the Sunday of Joy. What do we rejoice about in Advent? Isn’t it supposed to be a penitential time? The Christian must always seek to be joyful, even during penitence, because we are a Church oriented towards the Resurrection, towards the love of God for us. There are two types of “joy”: the self-directed “joy” I feel when I am gratified by something; and then there is true joy, which involves rejoicing in another. The first reading says that the Lord is going to clothe us in wedding garments. The joy we feel as Christians is the joy of someone who is getting married. This is the joy of giving oneself, not a joy that measures the value of something in terms of how beneficial it is to me. John the Baptist in the Gospel reading is a prime example of a person who is walking in the joy of the Lord. His entire mission is to point out Christ. He will not tell us who he is himself, only who he is not. He describes himself as a “voice”, but the words he speaks are the words of another and they are dedicated to showing the way to Christ the true light. Adam and Eve tried to make themselves the centre of existence, the light of their own world, but they fell into darkness. John the Baptist, by contrast, moves to the side and allows Jesus to come in. He allows the light to shine. John prepared the way for the Lord to come and Jesus will come into our lives too this Christmas if we stand aside and let him in, just as John stood aside! Our mission is not to serve ourselves but to point to another. In the age we live, humanity blesses its own name. We must learn to bless the name of the Lord

Joy is always a proper state for the Christian, even in the midst of penitence

This is Gaudete Sunday, the Sunday of Joy. Advent and Lent are both seasons of penitence, but both are broken by joyful celebrations on the fourth Sunday of Lent and the third Sunday of Advent. The Church is always joyful because it is primarily oriented towards Easter, towards new life. Therefore it is always turned away from the abyss and looking towards the heavens. Rejoicing is the proper state of the follower of Christ, not the state of sadness! Even in the midst of tribulation the Christian is capable of joy, but this is not to say that we are out of touch with reality. Our joy is a joy that is full of wisdom and fully cognizant of the negative realities in the world. The root of the word “gladness” in Italian (“letizia”) is also used for compost - it is something fertile! Christian gladness is a fertile state of being: it leads to something better and more beautiful.

The joy that we experience in Advent is like the joy of getting married. It is not a joy focussed on oneself but a joy that involves self-giving

The first reading prepares us for this new understanding of gladness or joy. It says: “I exult for joy in the Lord, my soul rejoices in my God”. The speaker is to be wrapped in the garments of a wedding ceremony, like a groom wearing a crown, or a bride wearing her jewels. The Lord treats me as if I am about to enter a wedding ceremony and encounter another person. The joy of entering a wedding relationship is a particular type of joy. We can imagine a person living in solitude who enters into relationship with others only if those relationships are beneficial to himself. Entering into the marriage relationship is joyful but it involves donating myself to the other. A meagre meal eaten in company is more joyful than exquisite food eaten alone or in anger. The marriage relationship is like the earth that produces green shoots. It is fertile to the extent that it involves self-giving and dying to oneself.

John is a person whose focus is not on himself. He is a voice, but he allows another to speak through him.

Let us consider the Gospel in this light. Once again the text is focussed on John the Baptist. The passage is a bit curious in that it involves a series of negations. A man named John is sent from God to bear witness to the light. We are told that John himself is not the light, and when the officials ask him who he is, he denies that he is the Christ, Elijah or the prophet. “So who exactly are you then?” John replies, “I am the voice of one crying in the desert.” This does not tell us who John is either! He is only the voice - the words come from somebody else. John the Baptist bears witness to the light, but he himself is not light. How important this discourse is! John is the point of entry for the public ministry of Jesus. He has learned to be free from himself. God is working through him. In fact, Jesus says that his equal has never been born – he is the most extraordinary man in history up to that point. But he knows how to keep himself apart and be the voice for another. How liberating it is not to take oneself too seriously!

Adam and Eve tried to make themselves the centre, the light, and they fell into darkness. They failed to see that we are invited to a wedding relationship with him, not to a self-gratifying relationship with reality

What is the problem with Adam and Eve in Genesis 3? They try to place themselves at the centre of life, and as a result they become lost in darkness. How wonderful and illuminating is the figure of John the Baptist! He prepared the way for the Lord to come, and the Lord always comes when we put ourselves to one side. For we are invited to a marriage, not to a self-gratifying relationship with the Lord. We are called to fix our gaze on him and not on ourselves. We are asked to be his witnesses, not advocates for ourselves. How boring it is to listen to Christians who wish to speak primarily about what they have done, and who speak too little about what God has done. It gives us infinitely more dignity when we keep ourselves in our proper place, when we know how small we are, when we appreciate that our lives are directed not towards ourselves, but towards something else.

Our age is an age in which humanity blesses its own name. Advent is about learning to bless the Lord’s name when he comes. And he will certainly come if we move to the side.

We are living in an epoch where the human being has made himself the centre, the light, the focal point of reality. How can a creature as impoverished as I am put himself at the centre of reality! What we need to discover, instead, is that we are central only as far as the love of God is concerned. God is central, but he wishes to love us, marry us, to place a crown on our head and a ring on our hand. He wishes to unite with us and make us vest ourselves in the robe of justice, with the beautiful mantle of his love. And we must make ourselves small, make space for him in our lives. We must be able to say, “I was sent by God. It is not me who determines my mission and direction in life. My task is obedience and to follow the plan God has laid out for me. My task is to bear witness to the light, not present myself as the light”. In the spiritual life we often encounter people who have a messianic complex to some degree or other, people who present themselves as saviours of others. But only Christ can save! Let us learn to relativize our own significance! It is thanks to God that we are able to do the little that we do! If we pretend to be able to raise up others, then we take upon our shoulders an unbearable burden, and we will certainly disappoint. The Advent of the Lord is about blessing his name when he comes, and being free from preoccupation about our own. This is peace, and detachment, and freedom.

December 7^th 2014.  Second Sunday of Advent

Gospel: Mark 1:1-8

­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­Translated from a homily by Don Fabio Rosini, broadcast on Vatican Radio

Don Fabio’s reflection follows the Gospel reading ...

(Check us out on Facebook – Sunday Gospel Reflection)

GOSPEL Mark 1:1-8

The beginning of the Good News about Jesus Christ, the Son of God. It is written in the book of the prophet Isaiah:

Look, I am going to send my messenger before you; he will prepare your way.
A voice cries in the wilderness: Prepare a way for the Lord, make his paths straight.

And so it was that John the Baptist appeared in the wilderness, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. All Judaea and all the people of Jerusalem made their way to him, and as they were baptised by him in the river Jordan they confessed their sins. John wore a garment of camel-skin, and he lived on locusts and wild honey. In the course of his preaching he said, ‘Someone is following me, someone who is more powerful than I am, and I am not fit to kneel down and undo the strap of his sandals. I have baptised you with water, but he will baptise you with the Holy Spirit.’

The Gospel of the Lord: Praise to you Lord Jesus Christ

Kieran’s summary . . . In the first reading the Prophet Isaiah tells the people of Israel that their time of exile is over. All of us are in a state of exile in the sense that we are in various states of sin, discontent, dissatisfaction with our lives, conflict, unhappiness, lethargy. How do we escape from this state of exile? In the Gospel we are told that there is “Good News”. John the Baptist preaches a baptism of penitence for the forgiveness of sin and he tells us that Jesus will baptize us with the Holy Spirit. This is indeed Good News because it announces that our exile is over! Jesus is coming into our lives and he alone forgives sin. The water of John the Baptist accomplishes external cleaning, but only Jesus can touch our spirits and heal us within. The exile that each of us experiences is the exile due to sin, due to going our own way, due to our self-referential lives. In the Old Testament, two verbs are reserved for God alone: “to create” and “to forgive”. We can change the external circumstances of our lives as much as we like, but the only solution to our exile is to allow the Lord to come to us and pardon us for  the ways we separate ourselves from him. Isaiah tells us that the Lord is coming with power. How does he manifest his power? By shepherding his flock! By picking up the lambs and looking after the mother ewes! This Advent let us allow the Lord to come and minister to us. Let us devote time to prayer, reflection and acts of penitence so that we will not miss the Lord when he comes to us with his tender pardon.

Isaiah announces that the end of the exile is near. The people of Israel are to return to their land. All of us are in exile and we need to return to our true home. Where is this home? How do we get there?

St Mark will be accompanying us for the forthcoming year, and on Sunday we read the very first lines from his Gospel. “The beginning of the Good News about Jesus Christ, the Son of God”. This verse using the very same term found in the opening words of the Greek version of the book of Genesis, “In the beginning . . ” And the story of Jesus begins with good news. To understand better this good news, let us look at the first reading from Isaiah. The prophet is announcing the end of the days of exile. “Console my people, console them. Speak to the heart of Jerusalem and call to her that her time of service is ended, that her sin is atoned for, that she has received from the hand of the Lord double punishment for all her crimes.” The oppression is now over and better days are about to begin. Isaiah is told to climb a high mountain and relate the joyful message to Zion. What is this good news? Isaiah is to announce the return from exile, but he is also to relate a message of a much deeper and far-reaching sort. And this message is relevant for each of us today. The human being is typically in a state of exile. Redemption involves a return to an original state. We are all lacking in fullness; we feel dissatisfied with where we are to some extent; we are all in need of being restored to our own true land and to feel at home with ourselves. The people of Israel are in a similar state of exile and Isaiah announces to them that the Lord himself will come. The return from exile is a great thing, but the happier news is that the Lord himself will come to take care of us. He will come and exercise his dominion, revealing his power to everyone. And the way in which he will manifest his power is striking! He will be a shepherd to us and gather the lambs in his arms! When the Lord comes, he will establish a relationship of tenderness with us.

The real exile we all experience is the exile of being in a state of sin. Only God can bring us home from this exile by forgiving us at the depth of our being

The text of the first reading is explicitly cited in Sunday’s Gospel. “Look, I am going to send my messenger before you; he will prepare your way. A voice cries in the wilderness: Prepare a way for the Lord, make his paths straight.” John the Baptist appears and proclaims a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. In the first reading the Lord had told Isaiah that Jerusalem’s sin was atoned for and that she had already received double punishment for all her offences. The punishment for sin was finished and the time of the pardon had come. Often we implore the Lord to free us from our various exiles and resolve our problems, but the basic thing we need is pardon and the wiping away of our sin. The fundamental message of John the Baptist was the forgiveness of sin. The people were baptized by him and confessed their sins. The real issue in life is to find pardon, to find the one who loves us over and above any guilt that we might have. In the Old Testament there are two verbs that are set aside for God alone. One is bara’ which means “to create”, an action this is exclusively reserved to God. The other verb, salah, means “to forgive”. Only God is capable of authentic forgiveness.

Sometimes we think that if we change our external circumstances, then everything will be all right. But what we need desperately is the touch of the Lord’s pardon within

All of us seek a better situation of life, a better “box” in which to live. But the changing of our external circumstances will not bring about that which we really need, which is to be loved completely and unconditionally. John the Baptist announces a baptism of water that prefigures a baptism of the Spirit. Water washes our bodies and signifies all of the external acts that we can do in order to say, “Lord forgive me! I have made a mistake! Accept me in my weakness! Take me as I am! Purify me!” Water cannot touch us within, but when the Lord comes he touches us at the level of our very spirit, the deepest part of us. The Spirit of Jesus enters us at our most intimate level and he enters as forgiveness, acceptance, love. The Church has a host of saints who console us and inspire us. All of these saints are filled with the sense of the pardon of God, with a profound awareness of the love of God for each of us. The Holy Spirit speaks to our hearts and says, “The time is over! You no longer have to handle the sad and irresolvable matter of sin. Tribulation is over! The Lord is here! Pardon is here!” When a person is visited by the Holy Spirit, he is visited by the Spirit that regenerates, the Spirit who is love.

This Advent let us straighten the ways so that the Lord can enter. Let us devote time to prayer and reflection, acts of penitence, so that we will be attentive to him when he comes with his pardon

In this time of Advent we are challenged to pay attention to what is going on in our lives, to straighten the paths, take care of our relationship with the Lord, cultivate habits that help to keep us in contact with Him, devote time to prayer, exercise the acts of penitence that every Christian is asked to undertake in order to combat our lethargy. Our Lord is coming and he loves us! Let us be attentive to his coming! He takes the lambs in his arms, we are told, and all of us are lambs that need to be carried by Him, forgiven by Him. As Isaiah says, the Lord leads the mother ewe to its rest. How the Lord wishes us to bring to fruition many things in our lives, but in our haste and fretfulness we do not bring them to birth. The Lord gives us the time we need to bring our works to joyful completion. His coming permits us to do all things, for his coming is our pardon.