In our Gospel today, St. Luke sets the stage for introducing John the Baptist by outlining the ruling powers of the time. He tells us that it is the 15th year in the reign of Tiberius as Emperor of Rome and that Pontius Pilate is governor of Judea. He names three client kings, who served at Rome’s pleasure, and the high priests Annas and his son-in-law Caiaphas.
What Luke’s readers would have known, and what we miss because we don’t know the history very well, is that the Jews in this list had sold out to the Roman occupiers, and that together with their Roman rulers, these local puppets were brutal and despotic in their treatment of the Jews.
It was a pretty desperate scene, not all dissimilar to what the Jews had experienced during slavery in Egypt and during exile in Babylon.
And so, when St. Luke sets the scene by reminding people of this sad state of affairs, he is connecting John the Baptist to the prophetic tradition of Moses, Baruch and Isaiah – the tradition of prophets announcing that God had not forgotten His people and that He was about to act to save them – to overthrow the regime of evil and to establish His rule of justice and peace.
Sure enough, John appears not in the city of Jerusalem, but in the desert wilderness, just like when Moses led Israel out of Egypt, and just as Isaiah had foretold: “a voice crying out in the desert.”
In fact, Luke puts the words of Isaiah’s prophecy directly on the lips of John: “Prepare the way of the Lord, make straight His paths. The winding road shall be made straight and the rough way made smooth, and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.”
In other words: get ready; God is about to take action! He has not forgotten or abandoned you, and He is about to arrive with your salvation!
Of course that’s why we read these readings throughout our Advent season. No, they don’t tell the story of the preparations for Jesus’ birth in Bethlehem 2000 years ago. We don’t hear the story of the Annunciation quite yet, or of Joseph’s visions in his dreams. For now, we hear the prophecies of God’s saving action that make this Advent season a time of joyful waiting and anticipation.
So as we await and anticipate the fulfillment of God’s promise, as we long for the arrival of our salvation, we can look to John the Baptist’s preaching as an outline for how we should prepare. Luke says: “John went through the whole region of the Jordan, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.”
That’s how we can prepare, and make the paths straight, and the valleys and hills level and smooth. We can prepare our own hearts and minds by repenting of our sins and receiving forgiveness for our sins.
The best way for us to do this is to receive the Sacrament of Reconciliation.
One of the greatest gifts I’ve received in my return to Notre Dame this year is to have the chance to hear confessions in the Basilica. It may be true that Catholics go to Confession less than they used to, but if you paid any attention to the number of times that Confessions are heard at the Basilica, and the lines that form there, you could never claim that Reconciliation is a dead Sacrament. Still, I think even more of us could make regular use of this Sacrament – could discover the great gift that this Sacrament is.
I know that I discovered just that, when I was in high school and college. There was a time when I thought I didn’t need to go to Reconciliation regularly. I certainly didn’t think I was without sin, but neither did I think that I was so bad that I needed to go more than once or twice a year. I figured I knew what my sins were and it wouldn’t do me any good to beat myself up over them by going to Confession every couple of weeks.
Then I started going more regularly. And what I found was that Reconciliation was less about my sinfulness, and more about God’s mercy. I found that confessing my sins, and receiving absolution was a great relief. Even if at first I entered the confessional ashamed and nervous, I always left the confessional feeling an immense relief and a deep peace.
Therein lies the greatness of this Sacrament that Christ Himself gave us: we are assured of God’s mercy! We hear the priest say in the name of Christ and the Church: “I absolve you of your sins”
I once heard a Jewish woman say that we Catholics are lucky. On Yom Kippur, she said, she goes to Temple and prays all day in repentance for her sins. But then she goes home at the end of the day and, she said, “I don’t hear whether or not I am forgiven.” We do, every time we confess.
In Reconciliation we are restored to our Baptismal innocence, and strengthened for a serious striving towards holiness. As St. Paul prays in today’s second reading, “our love increases ever more” and we are better able to “ discern what is of value, so that we may be pure and blameless for the day of Christ, filled with the fruit of righteousness.”
In other words, if we want to be more serious in our life of faith; if we want to experience the peace and joy that only God can give; if we want to treat ourselves and everyone around us with the respect that we know we and they deserve; then we will go to Reconciliation more often. We will come to be certain of God’s mercy through it, and we will joyfully share it with others.
Take up the opportunity that this season of Advent offers you to make straight the path in your own heart for Jesus to come and make His home there. If you do, then in the words of St. Paul’s letter: “I am confident of this, that the One who began this good work in you will continue to complete it until the day of Christ Jesus.”
No comments:
Post a Comment