Link
to Today's Readings
Isaiah 61: 1-2a, 10-11 + Luke 1: 46-50, 53-54 + 1 Thess. 5:16-24 + John 1: 6-8, 19-28
Isaiah 61: 1-2a, 10-11 + Luke 1: 46-50, 53-54 + 1 Thess. 5:16-24 + John 1: 6-8, 19-28
As human beings, we cannot live without
hope.
We cannot live without something to look
forward to.
Without hope, our hearts harden, and we
slowly die in despair.
We may be alive and functioning, but
without hope we are not truly living.
The Prophet Isaiah proclaims words of hope
to a people who have lost all reason to hope. The people of Jerusalem and all
of Judah are being held captive in Babylon, and their
beloved temple and capital city have been burned to the ground. They have
hung up their harps for they no longer have reason to sing; instead they
weep over all they have lost.
Isaiah stirs up the dying embers of their
hope into a mighty flame by assuring them that the God who
saved them from slavery in Egypt and did such mighty deeds in the desert
and led them into the Promised Land, will save them again, will bring liberty
to these captives and heal their broken hearts.
The 61st chapter of Isaiah
proclaimed today dates to the period immediately
after the return of the people from exile in Babylon. God made a way home
for a people who had been imprisoned in exile, but now they stare
forlornly at the ruins of Jerusalem, wondering
how they will ever rebuild their temple, their city, and their lives. The
stirring words and beautiful images spoken by Isaiah strengthen their
hope, so they might begin again.
We have even more reason than Isaiah and
his people for hope.
The coming of the promised Messiah in
history immeasurably confirms and strengthens our
hope. As the promised Messiah, as Hope enfleshed, Jesus reveals to us that
God is not far off, but is already in our midst.
Thus, hope is the reason for this Season
of Advent.
All our hopes are rooted in the Coming
One, the Messiah and Lord, who frees us
from sins that enslave us, who is the Light scattering the darkness of
despair, the One who heals our hurting hearts. The challenge remains,
though, to recognize the Messiah in our midst.
Like the priests and Levites and Pharisees
sent from Jerusalem to question John the Baptist, we do not
recognize the Messiah in our midst. The problem is not that He does not
come, for he keeps on coming in mysterious and hidden ways by the working
of the Holy Spirit. The problem is we do not recognize his coming.
You may have heard the following story
about a monastery that had fallen on hard times. The monks did not talk with
one another; there were no new, young monks; and
people had stopped coming to the monastery for spiritual solace and direction.
In the woods that surrounded the monastery
a rabbi lived in a small hut. Occasionally,
the monks would see the rabbi walking in the woods, and, almost
hypnotically, they would say to one another, “The rabbi walks in the woods.”
The abbot was greatly distraught at the
decline of the monastery. He had prayed and pondered over the
situation and admonished the mood and behavior of the monks--all to no
avail. One day he saw the rabbi walking in the woods and decided to ask
his advice.
He walked up behind the rabbi. The
rabbi turned, and when the abbot and the rabbi faced one another, both
began to weep. The sorrow of the situation affected them deeply. The abbot
knew he did not have to explain the decline of the monastery. He merely
asked, “Can you give me some direction so the monastery will thrive again?” The rabbi said, “One
of you is the Messiah.” Then he turned and continued to
walk in the woods.
The abbot returned to the monastery. The
monks had seen him talking to the rabbi who walks in the woods. They
asked, “What did the rabbi say?”
“One of us is the Messiah,” the
abbot said the words slowly, almost
incredulously.
The monks began talking to one
another. “One of us? Which one? Is it Brother
John? Or perhaps it is Brother Andrew? Could it even be the abbot?”
Slowly, things began to change at the
monastery.
The monks began to look for the Messiah in
each other,and listen to each other’s words for the
Messiah’s voice. Soon new, younger monks joined, and people returned to
the monastery for spiritual solace and direction.
If we live with this consciousness that
the Messiah is in our midst, then our world
will be transformed. If we live with this awakening alertness, with a new
level of attention to others, and treat each person as if he or she were
Christ Himself coming to us, think
of what would happen. Racism would be eradicated from our
midst. Violence would be replaced by peace. Torture
would be no more, not only the terror of water boarding, but emotional
torture as well--gossip and slander which rip apart another’s reputation.
If we choose to live with the awareness
that the Messiah may be coming to us in the most
unlikely of people, we can then be a saving instrument of hope. We can
joyfully bring glad tidings to the poor by our generous gifts and by
working for justice. We can heal those whose hearts are broken by
listening to their sorrow with compassion, and walking with them in their
pain. We can release those held captive by fear or doubt or despair.
This new state of heightened awareness
means putting technology in its proper place, pulling it away from the center
of our attention, by lifting our heads from our glowing screens and
becoming more aware of those around us.
I’d like to call this heightened state of
awareness, “John the Baptist consciousness.” Humble like him, we know who we are
not---we are not the Savior, Christ is. The world does
not revolve around us, it revolves around Him. With this kind of awareness
we know who we are and what we are about — we are to prepare the way for
the Lord by welcoming Him present in others.
Alert to welcome the coming Messiah, we
find we are more alive than ever before. Living to serve Christ in others,
loving Him present there, we discover a new-found joy. A
joy that is much different than the fleeting nature of pleasure, a joy
that is a gift of the Spirit, empowering us to rejoice always.
So, we rejoice with the Blessed Virgin
Mary, for like her, we are pregnant with Hope, because God has done great things
for us and will continue to do so. We sing with
Mary because God in Christ has lifted up we who are lowly to new life, in
Him and with Him and through Him.
Fr.
Joseph A. Jacobi
