As we
enter our 2nd week of Advent, we prepare for the coming of Christ's
birth into our world. We await his
arrival with vigilance and prayer.
Today, we hear the voice of John the Baptist crying out in the desert.
It's so striking that we're told of the powerful Roman leaders of the region,
of the high priests of the Temple, but they're not the ones who announce and prepare
the way of the Lord. Rather, it falls to
an eccentric wilderness prophet to get us ready for the coming of Christ.
As we
actively wait during Advent, undertaking special prayers and devotions in this
season of preparation and renewal, we hear about John the Baptist. Today's
Gospel talks about John’s voice crying out in the desert wilderness, but the
desert is more than just the location where John the Baptist's public ministry
took place. As modern Americans, we might think of the desert as arid and
desolate, but in the eyes of the Hebrew prophets, the desert was the place
where the Israelites first encountered God and where they faithfully responded
on their way to the promised land. The voice of John the Baptist crying out was
a call for Israel to return to this metaphorical desert, to return to
faithfulness, to respond to God's grace as it had done long ago. This desert
metaphor juxtaposes God's grace with the response of the people as they
remember how God led them out of Egypt into the desert on their way to the
promised land, as they responded to God's call in the reality of their
lives.
As we
are in the middle of our Advent time of preparation, it is good for us to look
at the image of the desert that Pope Benedict XVI uses to talk about the year
of faith as well. He notes that at the
time the Second Vatican Council met in the early 1960s, it was already possible
to see in our human history what a world without God would look like. The world was still trying to recover from
the tragedy of two huge wars: WWII and the Korean War. The tumult that shook the institutions of
Western Society was just beginning. Now,
in our world today, we can see how secularism has spread and has created a desert and a void where God is not present in much of our world. Benedict encourges us to start in this desert
enviornment to bring to our world the joy of believing in Christ. In the desert of our world today, we can
rediscover the value of what is essential in life. There are a lot of signs in our world today
of people who are thirsting for God in their lives, even though these signs are
often expressed negatively. People are
searching for meaning. They are in need
of those who can point them to the Promised land, who can point them to hope
and forgiveness and mercy. The living
faith that we are to bring to the world as followers of Christ, as Advent
people who prepare and wait with hope and expectation – our living faith can
open the hearts of others to the grace of God.
That is what we are to do as Christians, especially in the call we
receive in the Year of Faith. We are to help
bring a message that is so different from the revenge and pessimism so many in
our world embrace. Pope Benedict
proclaims that this new evangelization that we are called to means witnessing
to a new life that Christ calls us to, a life transformed by God.
May
Advent not only be a time of renewal and conversion in our lives & in the
life of our parish, but may we also see it as a time when we can reach out and
encourage others, helping them in discerning their call from God and in their
journey of faith.
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