November 29th, 2015 – First Sunday of Advent – Lectionary: 3
Reading 1 – Jeremiah 33: 14-16
The days are coming, says the LORD,
when I will fulfill the promise
I made to the house of Israel and Judah.
In those days, in that time,
I will raise up for David a just shoot ;
he shall do what is right and just in the land.
In those days Judah shall be safe
and Jerusalem shall dwell secure;
this is what they shall call her:
“The LORD our justice.”
Responsorial Psalm – Psalm 25: 4-5, 8-9, 10, 14
- To you, O Lord, I lift my soul.
Your ways, O LORD, make known to me;
teach me your paths,
Guide me in your truth and teach me,
for you are God my savior,
and for you I wait all the day. -
To you, O Lord, I lift my soul.
Good and upright is the LORD;
thus he shows sinners the way.
He guides the humble to justice,
and teaches the humble his way. -
To you, O Lord, I lift my soul.
All the paths of the LORD are kindness and constancy
toward those who keep his covenant and his decrees.
The friendship of the LORD is with those who fear him,
and his covenant, for their instruction. - To you, O Lord, I lift my soul.
Reading 2 – 1 Thessalonians 3: 12-4:2
Brothers and sisters:
May the Lord make you increase and abound in love
for one another and for all,
just as we have for you,
so as to strengthen your hearts,
to be blameless in holiness before our God and Father
at the coming of our Lord Jesus with all his holy ones. Amen.
Finally, brothers and sisters,
we earnestly ask and exhort you in the Lord Jesus that,
as you received from us
how you should conduct yourselves to please God
and as you are conducting yourselves
you do so even more.
For you know what instructions we gave you through the Lord Jesus.
Gospel – Luke 21: 25-28, 34-36
Jesus said to his disciples:
“There will be signs in the sun, the moon, and the stars,
and on earth nations will be in dismay,
perplexed by the roaring of the sea and the waves.
People will die of fright
in anticipation of what is coming upon the world,
for the powers of the heavens will be shaken.
And then they will see the Son of Man
coming in a cloud with power and great glory.
But when these signs begin to happen,
stand erect and raise your heads
because your redemption is at hand.
“Beware that your hearts do not become drowsy
from carousing and drunkenness
and the anxieties of daily life,
and that day catch you by surprise like a trap.
For that day will assault everyone
who lives on the face of the earth.
Be vigilant at all times
and pray that you have the strength
to escape the tribulations that are imminent
and to stand before the Son of Man.”
Listen to the Scriptures: click on the link below:
http://ccc.usccb.org/cccradio/NABPodcasts/15_11_29.mp3
1st SUNDAY OF ADVENT – C
Theme: ADVENT LOOKS FORWARD, with eager yearning, rather to the second coming of our Lord into this world than simply to a celebration on December 25th of his first coming. This Second Coming will establish his kingdom forever and vindicate the faith of all who have put their trust in him. Keeping Advent, however, does not imply a merely passive waiting: it challenges us to prepare our hearts and our world to receive him.
Introduction: Advent reminds us Christians that we are waiting. And we know for whom we are waiting. We are not “of little faith.” “We are waiting for the Lord Jesus Christ” (Phil 3:20). We have glimpsed his glory, “the glory that is his as the only Son of the Father, full of grace and truth;” we know that “he is the true light that enlightens all men,” and that “to all who accept him he gives power to become children of God” (John 1).
Point 1: A Rich Season. As it is difficult in the contemporary world to keep a religious observance of Christmas, so it is difficult to keep a good Advent, but we should try to profit by so rich a season. Perhaps the recollection of our Lord’s first “Coming” to the world will help us understand. God promised our first parents salvation from sin and death, but he did not say when it would come about. So began the weary waiting recorded in the Old Testament – a sad history of idolatry, stiff-neckedness, persecution, and captivity. Still “the immense presentiment of Israel” persisted and the prophets yearned for the coming of him whom they called “the desire of the everlasting hills.”
Point 2: An Unfinished Symphony. Our world then is an unfinished symphony. For us Christians, the future governs the present. Our manner of life is like that of men released from a concentration camp and awaiting transportation home; we live in this place like men rescued and redeemed, knowing that “we have not here an abiding city.” We are “preparing the way of the Lord,” the Lord “who makes all things new.” “One is our master, Christ,” and we turn to him as “the way, the truth, and the life,” – the only defense, really, of human dignity, freedom, and creativity. We are men and women graced by Christ for an eternal destiny; it has not appeared, as St. John tells us, “what we shall be.”
Point 3: Compassion Needed. This is not to say that we can detach our effort from the world that lies about us now. On the contrary, we look at its achievements with admiration and its problems with compassion. Our brother and sister– yes, our brother and sister – are destitute in a world of unprecedented affluence. They groan under oppression, or amid the ravages of senseless wars. They cannot find employment, or a living wage, or a home fit for human habitation. They are lonely in a faceless crowd. They are young but bewildered, and see no prospect of a meaningful life. They are handicapped, or sick, or old, or maladjusted. They aspire, as all do, to dignity, to freedom, to a voice and a share in shaping their own destiny, but they know themselves to be without power, without an advocate, without hope. Small wonder if they turn to violence, to delinquency, to addiction, to revolution.
Conclusion: No one who has eyes to see will think this picture of our society exaggerated. Someone might ask, however, what a church might be expected to do about it. It seems that our largest and best contribution will always be the people we form and send into society. Are they liberated – from ignorance, from the clutter of things, from the idolatry of self? It is the purpose and the glory of the Church to aid in that formation. And we come to the awesome task of formation with values, judgments, and truth that are not of our sole creating and with power that supplies for our limitations. Advent is a season for dreaming, for generous planning, for prodigious expectation. What will God do for us as a church, as a community? What will he do through us? “Stir up your might, Lord, and come!”
QUESTIONS THAT MAY LEAD TO OTHER THOUGHTS / REFLECTION / DISCUSSION / WRITTEN.
- Do you think of your redemption as an on-going process in which you are called to cooperate actively, that with the passing years you are to become holier, more like Christ, and that you have the means to grow in this fashion? In what ways have you changed? From what to what? In what ways have you become holier, more like Christ?
- Is it naïve, in view of human history, to believe in the possibility of a better world? a world at peace?
- How have you made the place or places, the communities in which you have lived better? Give examples.
In listening to the words from the Gospel of Luke on this first Sunday of Advent in the Year of our Lord 2009 remember the following points:
- There is the conception of the second coming of Jesus Christ. There has always been much useless argument and speculation about the second coming. When it will be and what it will be like, are not ours to know. But the one great truth it enshrines is this–that history is going somewhere. The Stoics of the past regarded history as circular. They held that every three thousand years or so the world was consumed by a great conflagration, then it started all over again and history repeated itself. That meant that history was going nowhere and men were tramping round on a kind of eternal treadmill. The Christian conception of history is that it has a goal and at that goal Jesus Christ will be Lord of all. That is all we know, and all we need to know.
- There is stressed the need to be upon the watch. The Christian must never come to think that he is living in a settled situation. He must be a one who lives in a permanent state of expectation. A novelist, in one of her books, has a character who will not stoop to certain things that others do. “I know,” she said, “that some day the great thing will come into my life and I want to keep myself fit to take it.” We must live forever in the shadow of eternity, in the certainty that we are those who are fitting or unfitting themselves to appear in the presence of God. There can be nothing so thrilling or challenging as the Christian life.
- Jesus spent the day amidst the crowds of the Temple; he spent the night beneath the stars with God. He won his strength to meet the crowds through his quiet time alone; he could face men because he came to men from God’s presence.
We need to learn a great lesson from St. Paul as we wait upon the Lord. It is in a simple passage like the one we read in today’s liturgy that the instinctive turn of Paul’s mind is best seen. For him everything was of God.
- He prays to God to open a way for him whereby he may come to Thessalonica. It was to God that he turned for guidance in the ordinary day to day problems of life. One of the great mistakes of life is to turn to God only in the overpowering emergencies and the shattering crises.
When one lives by the sea and depends on the sea as fishermen do the weather becomes important. However, when you are on land and “safe” you do not pay that much attention to the weather, but when you are about to go out to sea you watch and observe and “listen” to see what weather to expect for your life may depend on it. It is quite possible to do without the weather forecasts when life is comfortably safe; it is essential to listen when life might depend on them.
We are apt to try to do the same with God. In ordinary things we disregard him, thinking that we can manage well enough by ourselves; in the emergency we clutch at him, knowing that we cannot get through without him. It was not so with Paul. Even in an ordinary routine thing like a journey from Athens to Thessalonica it was to God that he looked for guidance. We use him to try to achieve a God-rescued life; Paul companied with him to achieve a God-directed life.
- He prays to God that he will enable the Thessalonians to fulfil the law of love in their daily lives. We often wonder why the Christian life is so difficult, especially in the ordinary everyday relationships. The answer may very well be that we are trying to live it by ourselves. The one who goes out in the morning without prayer is, in effect, saying, “I can quite well tackle today on my own.” The one, who lays himself to rest without speaking to God, is, in effect, saying, “I can bear on my own whatever consequences today has brought.” John Buchan once described an atheist as “a man who has no invisible means of support.” It may well be that our failure to live the Christian life well is due to our trying to live it without the help of God–which is an impossible assignment.
- Paul prays to God for the ultimate safety. At this time his mind was full of thoughts of the Second Coming of Christ when men would stand before the judgment seat of God. It was his prayer that God would so preserve his people in righteousness that on that day they would not be ashamed. The only way to prepare to meet God is to live daily with him. The shock of that day will be not for those who have so lived that they have become God’s friends but for those who meet him as a terrible stranger.
For the Church: that we may live in the awareness of God’s presence with us today and look to the future with childlike expectancy for the fulfillment of God’s promises, let us pray to the Lord.
For the grace of vigilance: that we may stay attentive to the Word of God and the signs of our times so that our hearts may not be numbed into complacency nor our minds trapped by worry, let us pray to the Lord.
For strength and peace in the face of suffering: that God will plant the divine Word of hope deep in our hearts and give us the strength to remain faithful even when tragedy and suffering enter our lives, let us pray to the Lord.
For all who are gathered here: that Christ may increase our love for one another and help us to be overflowing with generosity toward all who are in need, let us pray to the Lord.
For all who live in fear and confusion, for those living in refugee camps or mighty fortresses, for those who have suffered abuse or who live with painful memories of wrongs they have done: that God’s loving embrace will free them from fear, heal their deepest selves and open a new way of life for them, let us pray to the Lord.
For all who are experiencing the collapse of social, political, and economic structures: that they may seek first the reign of God and find their security in God, let us pray to the Lord.
For all whose hopes are unfulfilled and whose dreams are dying: that God will inspire them with a new vision and a new opportunity to use their gifts and build up the human community, let us pray to the Lord.
For all who fear the approach of death: that God will free their hearts and help them to look expectantly to Christ who brings life and salvation, let us pray to the Lord.
For all burdened with guilt and scruples: that they may experience God’s redeeming love and accept the gift of freedom that God’s love and mercy brings, let us pray to the Lord.
For a renewed dedication to social justice: that God will strengthen our hearts, help us be aware of the pain of injustice, and guide us in bringing healing, justice and peace to all who suffer, let us pray to the Lord.
For all who are away from home, especially those serving in the military or humanitarian relief services: that their hearts will be renewed and that they may return to their loved ones soon, let us pray to the Lord.
For all who are ill, especially those who are facing surgery: that God’s healing Spirit will be with them to strengthen and comfort them, let us pray to the Lord.
For all who are recovering from natural disasters: that God will ease their loss, give them strength to move forward, and help them find the assistance which they need, let us pray to the Lord.
For Peace, particularly in the Middle East: that God turn hearts and bring an end to violence in Syria, Israel and Gaza, let us pray to the Lord.