Repeating

Fourth Sunday of Advent

    I used to have SiriusXM Radio in my car, but I got tired of having to verbally fight with them to get the lowest rates, so I decided to try streaming music instead.  And because I’m frugal (others would use the word cheap), I wanted a free source.  I tried Pandora at first, but then everyone I know encouraged me to get Spotify.  I like the idea of being able to like certain songs, and have what I’m sure is an algorithm suggest other songs like it to which I can listen.  
    But what I have noticed is that, with occasional exceptions, it tends to play the same songs over and over again in any playlist I have.  Even when I get a rare new song and like the song, it still tends to take me back into a rotation of about 30 songs, so I feel like I’m hearing the same songs over and over again.

    You may have the same feeling with today’s Gospel reading, though maybe not as strongly.  This Gospel passage, from the first chapter of the Gospel according to St. Matthew, was the Gospel for the day on 18 December; it’s the Gospel today; and it will be the Gospel for the 4:30 p.m. Christmas Eve Mass.  I can imagine what your mind goes to when you hear the words, “This is how the birth of Jesus Christ came about.”  It’s probably something like, “Didn’t I just hear this?”  
    Beyond the Gospel, Catholicism is built on ritual.  The Mass is, substantially, the same every week.  The readings change, the preface sometimes change, and I generally alternate between different versions of the Eucharistic Prayer week by week, but not that much changes.  I will admit that I even sometimes check my blog with all my homilies to make sure that I’m not preaching the same thing year after year, especially with these seasons and days that have similar themes.  
    And some will criticize the ritual nature of Catholicism.  Our evangelical brothers and sisters might have a different service every month, even if there is a similar format.  There’s much more sense of inventing something new and exciting every year, probably because it appeals to our desire to be entertained.  And entertainment is, generally speaking, putting out new things that delight the fact that we’ve never seen it before.  While Hollywood has leaned on remakes of past releases, generally they are always making new movies.  Singers tend to include some old favorites at concerts, but more so tend to focus on the latest album they released.  
    But, as much as we find ourselves drawn to what is new and exciting (or, to use a newer word, bussin’), the human person has a need for routine and things that do not change.  Routine creates a certain calm or stability that we need.  Even in the hectic mornings when you’re getting yourself and/or your kids ready, your routine, even if interrupted, of putting on deoderant, brushing your teeth, combing your hair, shaving, putting on make-up, using cologne or perfume, probably gives you some sense of stability, even if the rest of the day is anything but stable.  And it opens up success for the future that chaos tends not to support.  Imagine that, to keep things new and fresh, you decided not to wear deodorant or brush your teeth.  It probably wouldn’t help you out in your day, and would create more stress.
    Ritual in the Catholic Church creates calm because our encounter with God is not meant to be a flurry of emotions, though we sometimes do get an emotive response.  Our worship of God should create a peace and quiet in us that allows to hear God, who often works in the stillness and silence.  An emotive high is like a drug: it’s exciting (for you younger folk, it slaps) when you experience something new.  But then, as you get used to new and ever-changing, the level of new and changing has to increase because your tolerance for new has increased, and the old new and exciting doesn’t give you the same high.  That’s why Catholic Masses are not and should not be like rock concerts.  There’s a place for that kind of music, in our devotional life, but in the Mass, we need to create a quiet space to encounter God, who didn’t come to Elijah in an earthquake, fire, or storm, but in the stillness.
    Routine and ritual also allow us to do what novelty never allows: go deeper.  When I’m just concerned about getting something new each time, I remain that the surface level, because I’m adjusting to stimuli I haven’t experienced before.  When I hear the same prayer or the same Gospel passage again and again, God desires that I do go deeper than just the surface.  It was only after a while of praying the fourth Eucharistic Prayer (which I use during Ordinary Time), that I recognized the words, “Look, O Lord, upon the Sacrifice which you yourself have provided for your Church…” could refer back to Genesis, when Abraham was on his way to sacrifice Isaac, his beloved Son, and Isaac asks where the sheep for sacrifice is, that Abraham says that God Himself will provide the sheep for the sacrifice.  As I grow in my understanding of the Scriptures, I see how they intertwine with the Mass, something we can miss if we only stay at the surface level.
    So, yes, we will hear again (if you go to the Vigil Mass of Christmas on Wednesday afternoon), “This is how the birth of Jesus Christ came about,” a passage that we have likely heard countless times.  But, as with this Gospel, so with the Mass: don’t stay at the surface.  Allow the calm of the ritual to push you into deeper meanings and connections throughout the rest of the Mass, the Scriptures, and the Church’s other teachings.  Don’t miss the depth God wants to reveal because you want something new and exciting each time.  Remain with God, the source of beauty, ever ancient, ever new. 

"Jesus Our Brother, Kind and Good"

Solemnity of the Nativity of the Lord
    Merry Christmas!  One of the non-theological things that I enjoyed most about seminary was the fraternity.  Now, when we think of fraternity and college students, our minds probably turn to John Belushi and rowdy houses filled with boys in men’s bodies, drinking, debauching, and the like.  But I mean fraternity in the sense of brotherhood.  I have two younger sisters, so going from that to a seminary with 80-110 young men my age was a big, but welcome shift.  It was good to have other guys with whom I could play the board game Risk or the video game Call of Duty, share the joys and struggles of the very fast-paced and filled-to-the-brim activities of preparing for the priesthood, play ultimate frisbee, and watch “Band of Brothers,” not to mention enjoying an adult beverage once we had come of age.  

    So, as we celebrate Christmas, my mind this year turned to Christ our brother.  This is part of the great news of Christmas and the Incarnation.  Jesus became our brother.  He took on our human nature, though without sin.  I’m sure the neighbor kids at Nazareth–where the Savior spent His youth after His family fled Bethlehem for Egypt, and then moved to Nazareth after leaving Egypt–played games with the young Messiah, talked about their joys and sorrows, and took time to enjoy His company.  
    But beyond the very human daily activities, Christ chose to stand in solidarity with us, to be united with us in all the things that made us great, and even took upon Himself all the sins that are the worst of us.  [That’s why we read the entire genealogy tonight, which I usually don’t do: to show that] Jesus became our brother, a descendant of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, a son of King David, and even joined with us in the darker parts and stories of our human family, names like Tamar, the wife of Uriah, Manasseh, whose wickedness led to the Babylonian Exile.  Christ was our brother with all the holy men and women who came before Him, and Christ was our brother with all the evil men and women who came before Him.  
    And because He is our brother, this gives us a certain familiarity.  This is certainly true for priests who are ordained to act in His Name.  One of my favorite lines of prayer comes from the Preface for the Chrism Mass: “…with a brother’s kindness he also chooses men to become sharers in his sacred ministry through the laying on of hands.”  But it’s also true for all the faithful, not just priests.  We hear it in the devotional Christmas carol, “Jesus Our Brother, Kind and Good,” whose title is the first line of the song.  We hear it in the third verse of the Christmas carol, “O Holy Night,” as we sing, “Chains shall he break, for the slave is our brother.”  We read it in the Letter to the Hebrews, chapter 2, verses 11-12: “Therefore, he is not ashamed to call them ‘brothers,’ saying: ‘I will proclaim your name to my brothers, in the midst of the assembly I will praise you.’”  
    But the mystery of the Incarnation is not simply about a fellow human who did some amazing things and lived a holy life.  The Redeemer is not only our brother; He is also our God.  He is not just a good man; or a good teacher; or a person who live an exemplary life.  He is the Eternal God, Son of the Eternal Father.  If He were only our brother, He could not save us, anymore than Abraham, Moses, or Elijah could save us, though they were holy and upright and allowed to work great deeds in God’s Name.  But, if He were not our brother, we would not feel the camaraderie with God that God desired us to have, like He had with Adam and Eve when He walked with them in the cool of the evening, as Genesis 3:8 says.  In the Messiah, the divinity of God, whom we cannot approach and before whom the proper response is to fall on our needs (again quoting “O Holy Night”), comes to us in a way that we can accept and feel comfortable, so that we could imagine, as the country singer Thomas Rhett does, having a beer with Jesus.  It all comes together in Christ, so that we can sing another great hymn, though not specifically about Christmas: “Jesus my Lord, my God, my all / How can I love thee as I ought?”  
    That is why our hearts are moved with great love and tenderness as we think on the Christ Child, lying in a manger, but also why I bowed before that same manger, and why we will all genuflect today as we profess our faith that, “by the Holy Spirit was incarnate of the Virgin Mary, and became man.”  In Jesus Christ, we encounter both our Lord who frees us from the bonds of sin and death, and our brother who shares with us in all that is truly good.  
    Today, as we come to receive Him in the Sacrament of the Eucharist at Holy Communion, we approach our Lord and our brother.  Probably, we each emphasize one or the other, but both are equally true.  Our goal as followers of Christ is to live both in balance.  If we tend to focus on Jesus as Lord most of the time, then perhaps allow a little more familiarity in your life with Him, and make it a point to remember that, aside from sin, He did not deem it unbecoming to take on all that it meant to be human: from soiling His diapers, to enjoying a good meal, to sitting with friends and just talking about life.  If we tend to focus on Jesus as our brother most of the time, then remember that our brother created all the heavens and the earth, and is our King, whom the angels dare not even look upon out of reverence and awe.  Both Lord and Brother come together in Christ, and are present with us here tonight, in you, the People He has made His own; in His Word, proclaimed to us and alive for us; in me, His brother who, despite my unworthiness, He chose to act in His Name and with His power; and most especially in the Eucharist, the Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity, of our Lord and our Brother who shares with us all that it truly means to be human and redeems us from all the fallen realities that were not supposed to be part of being human, but which we introduced into the world through our disobedience.  On this Holy Night/Day, may we remember and put into action in our lives the reality that Christ is both our Lord and our Brother, through the words of the hymn:
 

Truly He taught us to love one another;
His law is love and His gospel is peace.
Chains shall He break, for the slave is our brother,
And in His name all oppression shall cease.
Sweet hymns of joy in grateful chorus raise we;
Let all within us praise His holy name.
Christ is our Lord!  O praise His name forever!
His pow’r and glory evermore proclaim!

A Birthday and a Wedding

Solemnity of the Nativity of the Lord (Christmas)

    When we think of Christmas as a celebration, we often think of it as a birthday celebration.  And it certainly is.  We celebrate the birth of Jesus in the flesh in Bethlehem.  Some families have even gone so far as to have birthday cake on Christmas, or to sing “Happy Birthday” to Jesus at the family Christmas.
    But we can also think about Christmas as a wedding.  Our church takes on some of the appearance of a wedding.  At wedding, the church often is decorated with lots of flowers, like the poinsettias that we have here.  Often times you’ll have more candles lit at a wedding.  At wedding Masses we sing the Gloria, the song of the angels in heaven when Jesus was born.  And people dress up for weddings, like so many of you are dressed up today. 
    But the wedding that we celebrate is not between a man and wife, but between heaven and earth, between divinity and humanity, between God and man.  At Christmas heaven descends to earth as Jesus is born.  At Christmas we come to know of the union, never to be broken or divorced, between divinity and humanity in the Person of Jesus.  At Christmas, the angels make known the birth of the God-man, Jesus Christ, the Son of God and son of Mary. 
    The Prophet Isaiah himself uses the image of a wedding:

No more shall people call you “Forsaken,” or your land, “Desolate,” but you shall be called “My Delight,” and your land, “Espoused.”  For the Lord delights in you and makes your land his spouse.  As a young man marries a virgin, your Builder shall marry you; and as a bridegroom rejoices in his bride so shall your God rejoice in you.

God is our Builder and marries our humanity in Jesus.  God is our bridegroom and we, His people, are His bride.  No longer are we weighed down by our past sinfulness; no longer are we forsaken or desolate.  But we are the delight of the Lord, and espoused to Him. 
    We were not a bride that was desirable, because of our unfaithfulness.  We had been engaged or betrothed to God through Abraham, when God chose to make us His People.  But time and time again, we were unfaithful to God and wandered away from Him.  We were burdened by the yoke of slavery to sin, and Satan was our taskmaster.  But when Jesus Christ was born, He, the only one by whom we are saved, took us back to Himself and freed us from our bondage.  Jesus is truly “a savior…born for [us]” who heals us from our ancient wound of sin and gives us the freedom of the children of God.
    This is Good News!  This is the wedding announcement that should make all of us rejoice and be glad on this holy night/day.  For “The Lord has bared his holy arm in the sight of all the nations;” “All the ends of the earth have seen the saving power of God.”  “In times past, God spoke in partial and various ways to our ancestors through the prophets; in these last days, he has spoken to us through the Son.”  God has finally wedded us in Christ, and He will always stay faithful to His marriage vows, even when we stray and are unfaithful. 
    And this Good News is renewed for us each time we come to Mass.  In every Mass, it is as if Jesus is born again, as the bread and wine presented by you become the Body and Blood of Jesus.  Especially on Sunday Masses, we almost always sing the hymn of the angels, the Gloria, as Christ is born in our hearing of the Word of God, and in the confection of the Eucharist.  Heaven is joined to earth, with all the angels and saints, who worship God the Father through Christ the Son in the power of the Holy Spirit.
    But think about a wedding, and think about how you respond to that joyful news.  My sister, Allison, was married this past March, and my sister, Amanda, celebrates her 11th Anniversary on 27 December.  People were so happy and shared the news to those they met, in person and over social media.  Weddings are reasons for celebration and sharing that joy with others.  And so is the wedding of heaven and earth, divinity and humanity, God and man.  Isaiah encourages us: “How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him who brings glad tidings, announcing peace, bearing good news, announcing salvation.”  Will we keep this good news of this special wedding to ourselves?  Will we keep the lamp of joy under a bushel basket of fear?  Or will we join with the angels and shepherds in proclaiming to the ends of the earth the wedding which brings salvation to all those who have sat in the shadow of death?  The wedding is certainly good news.  And “Blessed are those called to the wedding feast of the Lamb.”

My brother-in-law, Tom, with my sister, Allison

St. Joseph: Our Model

Fourth Sunday of Advent

    In my nine years as a priest I have come to have a deeper devotion to St. Joseph.  While he’s quite popular with those selling houses, and certainly I knew about him while I was growing up, he was not on my original list of top saints.  The Blessed Mother was always a focus, as was St. Anthony (for obvious reasons), but St. Joseph always seemed to fade into the background, and was never very noticeable.
    The Scriptures do not record any words from St. Joseph (perhaps wives would suggest this silence to their husbands!), but he does play an important role in caring for the Blessed Virgin Mary and the child Jesus.  We hear about St. Joseph for the first time today in the Gospel according to St. Matthew: Joseph is a righteous man, and is visited by angels.  He, like Joseph in the Old Testament, is given the gift of powerful dreams, by which God directs St. Joseph. 
    But I think it’s important to look, once more, or perhaps for some of us, for the first time, at St. Joseph and his circumstances.  St. Joseph is engaged (betrothed) to the Blessed Virgin Mary.  He is planning on marrying her.  And then he finds out (I would guess Mary told him) that his fiancée is with child.  Can you imagine, gentleman, your fiancée sitting you down, and maybe the conversation goes something like this: “Honey, we need to talk” (never a good phrase to hear if you’re in a relationship).  “Dear, I need to let you know that I’m pregnant.  But don’t worry!  I wasn’t unfaithful to you.  An angel appeared to me and told me that I am going to be God’s Mother, that the Holy Spirit will make me conceive and the child will fulfill the promises made to our father David so many years ago.”  Can you imagine how you would have felt in such a circumstance?
    Understandably, Joseph is a bit shaken up, and decides to divorce Mary, but, knowing that if she is found to be with child without being married, she could be stoned to death for being an adulteress, he decides that things are going to be done quietly so as not to shame her.  This is part of the evidence of the fact that he was a righteous man.  He must have cared for Mary, but couldn’t see past this new situation in her life. 
    And then, to make matters even more confusing, an angel appears to him in a dream, and tells him to take Mary as his wife, because the child truly was conceived by the Holy Spirit.  And furthermore, Joseph is to name the child Jesus, Yeshua, which means in Hebrew, “God saves,” because Jesus will save the people from their sins.  After this dream, Joseph obeys God, and we know the rest of the story.
    It would have been easy for St. Joseph to walk away.  In modern terms, we could say that all that happened was “too much.”  Fiancées aren’t supposed to get pregnant before marriage.  Children aren’t supposed to be conceived by the Holy Spirit.  And most people don’t get dreams that come directly from God.  And yet St. Joseph doesn’t walk away.  He is obedient to God even in very difficult circumstances, which will become even more difficult, as Joseph and Mary have to leave Nazareth for Bethlehem, and then within two years they need to flee to Egypt, and then return to Bethlehem, and then Jesus stays behind on the family annual pilgrimage to Jerusalem. 
    Following God is not always easy.  There can be times where you want to walk away because things are not going the way we want them to go.  But St. Joseph is our model, for men and women, to follow the will of God. 
    Of course, just because the will of God is difficult, does not mean that it’s self-contradictory.  Sometimes people think that they are doing the will of God, when they’re really only following their own will or desires.  How do we know if it’s our will or our desire or the will of God?  Look to the Scriptures.  In the first reading, the Prophet Isaiah spoke for the Lord, saying that “the virgin shall conceive, and bear a son.”  So when Mary conceived without having relations with Joseph, it wasn’t the normal way to conceive, but it also wasn’t contrary to the will of God, since God himself had foretold it through Isaiah. 
    But, if what we think God is asking us is in accord with the Scriptures and the teachings of the Church, then God will help us through, no matter how difficult things can be.  It can even be that way with the Church.  Over the past few years we have had some difficult times: new scandals, including even a former cardinal; misuse of donations by some bishops; even some bishops and priests teaching contrary to the teachings of the Church.  We might be tempted to walk away, but St. Joseph encourages us to seek God’s will even in the midst of difficulties. 
    As we finish out these last days of Advent, may St. Joseph guide us to be faithful to God, no matter how difficult or how confusing.  And may we, like St. Joseph, have the courage to care for Jesus in our daily lives by being obedient to God’s will.

The Best Names

Solemnity of the Nativity of the Lord–Vigil Mass

Hopefully we all know that it is not kind to call people mean things.  We each have our own, beautiful names, which were chosen by our parents, and by which the Church has called all of us when we were baptized, when we were confirmed; when we were married or ordained.  And the Church will even call our name when we die.  Our names are important parts of who we are; in some ways they express who we are.  It is not kind to call people mean things instead of their name, things like: booger, stupid, stinky, or even Hey You.  

In our first reading, God talks about the name he will call Israel.  It will no longer be mean things, like “Forsaken,” or “Desolate.”  Those are mean things, things which mean there is no life, no people, and that no one loves them.  Instead, God says, Israel “shall be called ‘My Delight,’ and [its] land ‘Espoused.’”  God says that He will refer to Israel like a husband refers to his wife.  Today we might heard, “My love,” “Dear,” “Honey,” or some other sweet, kind names.

When a person call us a mean thing, it hurts us.  If it’s really mean, we might even cry.  When someone says something mean to us it makes us think that we’re not good, that the other person doesn’t like us, and that we’re alone.  But, when someone calls us by our name, or even by a kind thing, we feel great, we feel like others want us around, and we feel like we’re loved.

This evening we are in vigil.  That’s a fancy way of saying that we’re waiting.  When we began Mass at 4, it wasn’t even dark out!  It’s so early to be celebrating Christmas!  But we come to Mass because we are waiting, not for someone to come down a chimney, but to celebrate the birth of Jesus.  We are waiting and watching, trying to imagine what it was like for the Jews to wait for their Messiah to come to them, which happened when Jesus was born.  We wait, and the waiting gives us a kind of excitement, because we really want our waiting to be over, and for Christmas to be here!

But we should also be excited because of the name of the Person who is born at Christmas.  He kind of has two names.  The first name we hear a lot, hopefully when we’re praying and coming to Mass, not when someone is mad: that name is Jesus.  Jesus’ Name has a special meaning.  It means, “God saves.”  That’s a good name, because we know that we don’t always do what we’re supposed to; we don’t always make good choices.  Jesus, who is God, saves us from sin and death.  And that’s a beautiful name which gives us hope and love and should make us feel good.  And that’s the name that St. Joseph and the Blessed Virgin Mary gave to the little child that was born on Christmas.

But the angel also told Joseph about a second name for Jesus, a name that we don’t hear as often.  And that name is Emmanuel, which means God is with us.  That’s a beautiful name, too, because that name reminds us that we are never alone, and we always have someone who loves us.  That someone is God.  He loves us so much that He never wants to be separated from us.  He wants to be with us so much, that He sends His Only Begotten Son, Jesus, who lives just like us, but who never sins.  

We each have our own beautiful name by which we are known.  Maybe it’s Anthony, like me, or maybe Joseph, like the patron saint of this church building, or maybe it’s a different beautiful name.  But as we keep vigil, as we wait and watch for Jesus, we remember that God gave us someone with the most beautiful names ever, because they remind us how much God loves us and wants us to be with Him always.  That someone is Jesus, Emmanuel, who saves us and who is with us always.  And those are the best names of all.

How Blest We Are!!

Fourth Sunday of Advent

            When I was young (maybe younger is the better word here), I know that I did not understand how blessed I was.  I grew up in a middle class home with a loving family.  We never wanted for anything that we needed.  And yet, as I saw my friends in middle school and high school, all I could focus on was what I didn’t have, which made me blind to what I did have.  We never had video games.  The best we got was Oregon Trail (the old one, mind you) and Sim City.  My dad didn’t like to buy fruit snacks, both because they were not very healthy (that was probably more of my mom’s influence), and because they were expensive (that was certainly my dad’s doing).  We never went on a Spring Break trip to tropical locales like many of my friends did.  In fact, my first Spring Break trip was from St. Paul to Chicago as a freshman in college (not quite the exotic vacation you dream of in cold weather).  But, as I grew older, I have come to realize how blessed I truly was.

            As Catholics we can sometimes forget how blessed we with our faith.  When we grow up in a Catholic culture in our homes, it can be easy to take for granted the great gift we have in the opportunities to grow in our knowledge and love of Jesus.  It can be easy to forget that for two millennia or so, God’s chosen People were waiting for someone to undo the ancient curse that our first parents, Adam and Eve, brought upon the entire human race through original sin.

            God had promised to send a redeemer, but there was a lot of waiting involved.  Right after the Fall, God promised one who would strike at the head of the serpent.  Moses promised a great prophet, to whom the Jews must listen.  Our first reading, which is quoted by St. Matthew in our Gospel passage, gives us one of the Messianic promises of Isaiah, that “the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall name him Emmanuel,” which means God-with-us.  St. Paul reminds the Romans and us in the second reading, that the Good News that God has saved His people from their sins was “promised previously through his prophets in the holy Scriptures.”  Even our preface, the prayer I chant before the Holy, Holy, Holy reminds us of this fact, as it says, “For all the oracles of the prophets foretold him.” 

And at the time of Jesus, there was great longing for the Messiah: partly because the Jews wanted to be freed from their Roman oppressors, but also because it had been hundreds of years since the last prophet.  Can you imagine the anticipation of the Blessed Mother, knowing that the unseen child in her womb was truly the Son of God?  Every mother is excited to see her baby for the first time at its birth, but Mary’s excitement must have been even greater since this baby was not just her baby, but was also God-with-us.  Or think of John the Baptist.  In the womb he leapt for joy in the presence of Jesus at the Visitation of the Blessed Mother to her cousin Elizabeth.  But imagine his waiting, too, at the Jordan River, knowing that his whole mission was to point out the Messiah.  Our preface takes up their excitement, too, as it says, “the Virgin Mother longed for him with love beyond all telling, John the Baptist sang of his coming and proclaimed him when he came.”  Jesus Himself will say to his disciples: “Blessed are your eyes for what they see.  For many kings and prophets longed to see what you see and did not see it, and to hear what you hear and did not hear it.”  And again He says, “Abraham longed to see my day.” 

And we get to see and receive that Jesus.  We have been blessed in receiving that gift of faith in Jesus, knowing that He is the long-awaited Messiah!  We don’t have to wonder if God will ever make good on the promises He made from Adam and Eve, to Moses, and to the prophets.  We know that God has fulfilled His word in the Word-made-flesh, Jesus.  Do we realize how blessed we are?  Do we think about this in these last three days before Christmas?  Or are our hearts focused on what we don’t have: on the gifts we hope to get, the material things that we cannot afford?  Yes, we have been waiting for almost two millennia for Jesus to return as He promised, but we don’t have to wonder if there ever will be a Messiah or not.  God has given us the Messiah, and since those first apostles, we have passed on that the God who created heaven and earth and all that is in them deigned, lowered Himself, to be seen, heard, and touched.  As the preface will say again, “already we rejoice at the mystery of the Nativity.”  We wait to celebrate what has already happened and so we can be joyful.

We can also be joyful because the same Jesus comes to us in this Mass, as He does at every Mass, in His Word spoken to us through the Scriptures; and in the Eucharist, the Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity of the same Jesus who was conceived by the Holy Spirit in the womb of the Blessed Mother, and who first showed us the Face of God as He was born in Bethlehem.  How blest are our eyes that see God and our ears that hear His Word!  In these last days of Advent, don’t get caught up in the rush to finish all the preparations, but take time in prayer to thank God for the many blessings that we have in our faith, especially for the gift of Jesus, the prophesied and long-awaited Messiah who makes Himself present for us each day, and especially each time we get to come to Mass.

"A Tale of Two Sons of David" by Fr. Anthony Strouse

Fourth Sunday of Advent

            “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.”  You don’t have to be a Jeopardy contestant to recognize that this quote comes from A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens.  It follows a number of different characters in London and Paris (the two cities to which the title refers) before the French Revolution.

            Our first reading and our Gospel today could be called A Tale of Two Sons of David (granted it doesn’t have the same ring).  In the first reading we have King Ahaz, the king of the Southern Kingdom of Judah.  Now, if we just skim over the reading, we may wonder why Isaiah the prophet is so hard on him.  After all, we often hear that we shouldn’t need to ask for signs from God; we should just have faith.

            But in this case, upon closer examination, we realize that God told Ahaz to ask for a sign.  Rather than being obedient to the Lord, likely speaking through Isaiah the prophet, Ahaz has a false piety which makes him think that God is trying to trip him up in telling Ahaz to ask for a sign, and so he declines the offer for a sign: “‘I will not ask!  I will not tempt the LORD.’”

            But God promises a sign to him anyway, a sign which is fulfilled in Jesus: “the virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall name him Emmanuel.”  And Emmanuel means God-with-us.  Jesus is the manifestation of the Father’s love, the Father’s very presence on earth.  He loves to be with us and just spend time with us, as a loving parent loves simply spending time with their children.

            Now the other son of David, St. Joseph, was almost the exact opposite.  He did not fake piety, but, as the Gospel relates, “was a righteous man.”  When he found out that Mary was pregnant, he assumed it was by some other man.  But, not wishing to bring shame to Mary, and really, if he wanted to, he could have had Mary killed, he decided to quietly divorce her.  Rather than taking full advantage of the Law that God had given through Moses, St. Joseph, because he was righteous, decides to extend mercy to Mary. 

            And because of his righteousness, and close attention to following the spirit of the Law, God gives St. Joseph a sign, a dream, without St. Joseph even asking for it, to confirm that the child in Mary’s womb was conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit, and which will fulfill the prophecy made to the first son of David, King Ahaz.  But, whereas the earlier son of David, Ahaz, doubted the Lord, the later son of David, Joseph, “did as the angel of the Lord had commanded him and took his wife into his home.” 

            As we round out this Advent Season and prepare for Christmas on Saturday, we have those two examples that we can follow: Ahaz and Joseph.  If we take Ahaz as our example, then the way we enter into Christmas is just to be very passive, and not really enter into the season.  We let the busyness of this last week of Christmas preparation: buying presents, sending cards, Christmas parties, etc., take over.  The problem is not the activity itself, but whether or not that is taking center stage in our lives.

            If we take Joseph as our example, then we make this last week of Advent a time of faith and mercy.  We still celebrate, and still prepare for the secular celebration, but we also try to take simple steps to trust more in the Holy Spirit and less in ourselves.  We seek mercy more than justice.  We spend time in silence thanking God for how much He really does want to be with us, to be Emmanuel.  

            And for us to be like Joseph doesn’t mean we need to have powerful dreams with God speaking to us as He did to Joseph.  Having faith in God means maybe saying a quick prayer before we go shopping for presents that God will guide us in making the right choices, not just that we get the gift that the person wants, but that reflects good stewardship of the gifts God has given to us, and that will build up the other person in holiness, even if that is done simply by allowing the person to relax and recreate in a new way.  Having faith in God means preparing to cook that Christmas dinner, or the part that we were given, but to trust God that it will turn out alright and provide nourishment for those who partake of it.  Having faith means celebrating with friends and family with all the usual Christmas songs that we hear and love, but making sure that our minds and hearts are focused on the real reason for Christmas: Jesus Christ our Lord and God.

            And just like Joseph, who was not well known, and is never recorded as saying a word in the Gospels, when we are faithful and grow in faith it will often not be in ways that many others notice, and that we might not even notice at first, but growing in faith will allow us to be more open to recognizing Christ in unexpected situations and providing for Him, just as St. Joseph protected Jesus by protecting and caring for the Blessed Mother, through our caring for family, friends, the poor, and the outcast.  Our Lord is coming and will not delay.  Blessed are those faithful servants whom the Master finds ready to welcome Him on His arrival.