Second Sunday of Advent
Cathedral of Mary Our Queen
December 9, 2023
Selective Hearing
As my parents grew older, their hearing progressively diminished. Try as I might, I couldn’t convince them to be fitted with hearing aids. In the meantime, Mom and Dad sometimes accused each other of hearing only they wanted to hear and told me that I speak too softly. Perhaps this sums up where we find ourselves on this Second Sunday of Advent: when it comes to our faith, we hear only what we want to hear; when it is time to bear witness to our faith, we speak too softly. Let us resolve to hear the Church’s Advent proclamation so that we may bear convincing witness to our faith!
The Proclamation of Isaiah
The Church’s proclamation is at full throttle on this Second Sunday of Advent. The ancient prophecy of Isaiah resounds as clear and as loud as ever: “A voice cries out: in the desert, prepare a way for the Lord!” Prophesying some seven centuries before the birth of Christ, Isaiah’s delivered a message of consolation and hope to a people living through the nightmare of the Babylonian exile. In the midst of desolation, Isaiah cried out full-throated: “Here is your God! Here comes with power the Lord God who rules by his strong arm… Like a shepherd he feeds his flock; in his arms he gathers the lambs, carrying them in his bosom and leading the ewes with care.”
But Isaiah’s words were met with skepticism and indifference. Just as the people did not want to hear about impending dangers before their exile, so now, in the midst of their humiliation, they resisted the promise of a better day. Yes, at first, the people mourned their loss and longed for the temple in Jerusalem. The Psalmist sang, “If I forget you, Jerusalem, may my right hand wither.” But as time wore on, and one generation succeeded another, memories faded. In fact, some decided to make the best of the situation they found themselves in: to abandon the ancient faith, to assimilate into the culture, and to prosper. They heard the words of Isaiah but were unprepared to listen to them.
Could it be that we are not unlike the people of Isaiah’s day? In a world where human trafficking and exile are all too common, we live in a relatively safe country that guarantees fundamental freedoms. How, then, are we like the exiles to whom Isaiah spoke? From the moment Jesus told us that we are “in the world but not of the world”, every generation of Christians, including us, has been living on this earth as exiles. Scripture attests and every saint who ever lived attests that our true homeland is in heaven, the new and eternal Jerusalem, where the justice and peace of God reigns without end. Now, to be sure, Jesus did not ask us to disengage from the world or to be unconcerned for it. No, he instructed us to be, like himself, Good Samaritans in a world of need, but also to keep our eyes fixed on our true homeland in heaven, whence comes our human dignity, our hope, and our help.
Yet, like the people in Isaiah’s day, we can be only too comfortable in our exile. We know this is not our permanent home but we do all we can to make it last. Something in us wants for more than this world can offer, yet so often we drown out that divine impulse by the distractions of this world. Meanwhile, memories fade and hope fades as the Faith is no longer passed along from generation to generation, and the young disaffiliate from the Church before they know their heritage and hope. Calls for evangelization, for Eucharistic revivals, for spirituality and service are met not with outright rejection, but rather with skepticism and indifference. Sometimes even Church leadership can decide simply to manage decline. No longer hearing the message of hope, they speak softly amid the din of culture.
The Proclamation of John the Baptist
Seven centuries after Isaiah, John the Baptist comes on the scene. John the Baptist is the great successor of Isaiah as he cries out to a people caught, not merely in the thrall of the Roman Empire but in the thrall of their sins: “Prepare a way for the Lord, make straight his paths!” John’s mission was to prepare the way for the Messiah, the Lord who would come and deliver his people from their sins.
John the Baptist was not a conventional character. He lived in the wilderness where he heard the voice of God and made a path for him. He owned nothing and lived off the land, as if to say that God was everything and that he totally trusted in the God who sent him. Like Isaiah he preached full-throated a message of forgiveness and restoration, but he also offered the people a baptism of repentance. Many heeded John’s invitation and message but others resisted him. Those who heard and rejected his message were the self-righteous, those who were satisfied with the status quo because they stood to profit from it. They heard but did not listen. They spoke but delivered a self-serving message. Those who listened were the poor in spirit and the pure of heart. They were prepared to welcome the One who came after John, the One whom John said would be mightier than he, the One whose sandal straps he was unworthy to loosen.
The Upshot
On this Second Sunday of Advent, let us ask ourselves: Will the proclamation of Isaiah and John the Baptist go unheeded in our lives? For all of the turmoil that surrounds us and for all the drama in our daily lives, are we in fact too comfortable in our exile or content with managing decline? Do we hear but fail to listen? Look, but fail to see? The message of Advent is that God has come in search of us. What will it take for you and me to hear, heed, and share this message?
John proclaimed a baptism of repentance and the Church, goading against the festivities of the season, urges that we take time during these fleeting days of December to fast and pray – not the showy fasting of the Pharisee but a true self-emptying, and not the noisy prayer of the Pharisee, but prayer that opens the heart to God, a prayer that is willing to hear and listen to the voice of God speaking in our depths, a prayer that enables us at long last to see everything that prevents the Lord from travelling the highways and byways of our complicated hearts. Sometime in these weeks leading up to Christmas, let’s make a good confession of sin, and let’s extend ourselves to a neglected friend or even an enemy. Let us buy gifts for loved ones but remember above all those in need. Let us try to bring a family member or friend back to the faith this Advent.
But most of all, let us hear and listen, look for and see the Lord is in our midst: ‘like a shepherd feeding his flock with his Eucharist, like a shepherd gathering us, his lambs, into the arms of his Church, like a shepherd carrying us, his sheep, close to his Sacred Heart, like a shepherd leading us, his ewes, to the mercy of the Confessional’ … leading us from the exile of sin to the light of his grace and from the light of his grace to the glory of heaven.