Today, we start our journey during the holy season of Advent at the beginning of our new liturgical year. During Advent, we will hear from some messengers and prophets, including John the Baptist and the Blessed Virgin Mary. On this 1st Sunday of Advent, we hear Jesus' prophecy about the end of the world and his second coming. We might wonder how this message about the end times to come ties into our celebration of Advent and our preparations for Christmas. I had not been a priest very long when a rather new Catholic came to me, telling me that this was the first Advent and Christmas he was observing as a Catholic. He was a anxious, wanting advice as to what he needed to do. He put it this way: What are the rules of Advent? What kind of fasting, praying, and other preparation do I need to do?
Although we journey through Advent and Christmas each year, perhaps we're also not quite sure how we should approach Advent this year. If we have challenges or struggles in our family life or at work or in school, perhaps it's tempting to think that these challenges and struggles prevent us to prepare properly during Advent. Perhaps we believe that in order to observe Advent, we need a big change in our mood and need to separate ourselves from our tough real life experiences. In fact, the opposite is true. Advent is about letting God come to us, about letting God enter our world in a special way in this time of waiting and expectation. By opening ourselves to Advent in the messiness of our lives, we'll open ourselves to God's message of salvation and his saving love, a message that we so desperately need to hear again even if we’ve heard it before.
Today's Gospel talks about the signs to come in the end times: the sun, the moon, and the stars will be changed, the nations of the earth will be perplexed and dismayed. This vision isn't meant to frighten us, but to encourage us and to give us hope. Jesus predicts that the world's natural order will be shaken up. But we are to stand firm against these upcoming disorders and temptations. We are to raise our heads up high because redemption is at hand. Jeremiah predicted that calamity and exile would befall Israel and Judah, but he gives a promise of new hope as well, of a shoot that will bud on the old stalk of David. Jeremiah gives the people a promise of recovery and of God's eternal fidelity. The Jews who suffered in exile and who looked back at bountiful days of the past can now look forward with longing and hope. During Advent, we are called to long for the Lord of justice that was foretold by Jeremiah, we are called to long for the birth of our Lord.
“Be vigilant at all times and pray”: this is Jesus’ command in today's Gospel. This is a good theme for us to keep in mind this Advent season. As a time of waiting and anticipation, Advent gets its title from the Latin word “adveniat,” which means to come or to arrive. But Advent is not a passive season where we sit around doing nothing while we wait. We have work to do during Advent, but this work is a process, an act of becoming. Before we can be vigilant, perhaps we need to become more transparent, to remove the masks we put up to ourselves and to the world.
I want to close my homily today with a great quote from St Cyril, the Bishop of Jerusalem in the middle of the 4th century. His quote ties together the two comings of Jesus that we prepare for during the season of Advent: “We do not preach only one coming of Christ, but a second as well, much more glorious than the first. The first coming was marked by patience; the second will bring the crown of a divine kingdom …. At the first coming (Jesus) was wrapped in swaddling clothes in a manger. At his second coming he will be clothed in light as in a garment. In the first coming he endured the cross, despising the shame; in the second coming he will be in glory, escorted by an army of angels.” In our time of preparation during Advent, we not only prepare for Christ’s first coming, but we look beyond that first coming, and we await the second.
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