Ever seen the movie “The Princess Bride?” There’s a scene where Wesley is scaling the cliff and Inigo is waiting at the top to duel him. Inigo is becoming impatient with how long it is taking Wesley to climb the cliff, so Inigo offers to throw him a rope. There is some dialogue about a lack of trust “since I am only waiting around to kill you.” Wesley tells Inigo he’ll just have to wait. Inigo says, “I hate waiting.”
I do too. I hate waiting. If we’re honest, we all hate waiting. Especially here in America. We are some of, if not the most, impatient people in the world. We live in an instant society. It really hasn’t helped us, I feel, as human beings that our lives are so instantaneous. And this has really negatively impacted us in the Church also, I feel. Advent, aside from being the beginning of the liturgical year, has traditionally been a season of waiting and anticipation. We are waiting to celebrate the birth of the Messiah, the God-man, Jesus of Nazareth. But we are also anticipating His return. When He ascended into heaven, Jesus promised His apostles (and us) that He would one day return. And so, we wait. We anticipate His return. And we’re really terrible at waiting. I feel like it’s because we don’t really know what to do while we wait. We don’t know how to prepare while we wait. Fortunately, the Holy Scriptures help us out in this area, as we find in our readings this week. For those who don’t know, I am using the new lectionary put out by the UCCB. It’s the one in most common usage in today’s Catholic Church. The second week of Advent traditionally focuses on St. John the Forerunner or, if you’re more comfortable with another title, St. John the Baptist. Not because he was Baptist but I digress… Our readings this week are: Isaiah 40:1-5, 9-11 Psalm 85 (or 84 if you’re using the Douay-Rheims):9-14 2 Peter 3:8-14 Mark 1:1-8 I invite you to read those now if you have not already done so. As we consider our texts this week and the mission of St. John the Forerunner and what Advent is all about, I want us to consider this idea of preparation. There are four specific things I want us to consider as it relates to preparing for the return of the Christ. I want us to consider and see from our texts the promise of preparation, the peace of preparation, the discipline of preparation and the humility of preparation. My old Protestant pastor is comin’ out in me a bit with the alliteration there but oh well. The Promise of Preparation (Isaiah 40:1-5, 9-11) We see the words of the LORD through the prophet Isaiah to the people of God. He tells His people to “be comforted.” And how are they to be comforted? They are comforted because evil has come to an end, their iniquity is forgiven, crooked ways shall become straight and rough ways plain. In verse 5 we have the wonderful promise that “the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh together shall see, that the mouth of the Lord has spoken.” He goes on to promise in verse 10, “Behold the Lord God shall come with strength, and his arm shall rule: Behold his reward is with him and his work is before him.” And the glorious promise of verse 11, “He shall feed his flock like a shepherd: he shall gather together the lambs with his arm, and shall take them up in his bosom, and he himself shall carry them that are with young.” The promise of preparation is the presence of the Shepherd. The Peace of Preparation (Psalm 85:9-14) The word “peace” is used twice specifically in this text, but we also see some strong imagery of peace and things being “made right.” Look at verse 9. God “will speak peace unto his people: And unto his saints: and unto them that are converted to the heart.” Verse 11 we are told that “justice and peace have kissed.” Verses 12-13 we see the images of peace and prosperity when the Psalmist tells us, “For the Lord will give goodness: and our earth shall yield her fruit. Justice shall walk before him: and shall set his steps in the way.” Goodness and the full yield of the earth’s fruits; justice and stability shall reign. The peace of preparation is found in the rich fullness of the justice of God. The Discipline of Preparation (2 Peter 3:8-14) Discipline is not a popular word for most of us. But one thing we can see from Holy Scripture is that the Christian life involves some things that are probably going to be uncomfortable for us. If we are in Christ, if we are His disciples, there are things we must do. St. Peter reminds us of some of these things, these disciplines in this text. Verse 9, he talks about God dealing patiently with us, “not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance.” (Douay-Rheims) Verse 11, he asks, “what manner of people ought you to be in holy conversation and godliness?” Verse 14, the Apostle reminds us, “Wherefore, dearly beloved, waiting for these things, be diligent that you may be found before him unspotted and blameless in peace.” The discipline of preparation is found in the penitent holiness of the diligent and unspotted people of God. The Humility of Preparation (Mark 1:1-8) Now we come to St. John the Forerunner. We see how he is directly linked to the prophecy of Isaiah in verse 3, “A voice of one crying in the desert: Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make straight his paths.” Aside from what St. John did to accomplish this, we are tasked with the same duties. We have work to do. We don’t get to just lay down and coast while we wait. No, we have work to do to prepare for Christ’s return. We too must proclaim St. John’s message: Prepare ye the way of the Lord and make straight his paths! We see St. John’s humility in how he was clothed and his austere food choices. We see his humility in testimony when St. Mark tells us, “And he preached saying: There cometh after me one mightier than I, the latchet of whose shoes I am not worthy to stoop down and loose.” St. John was a big deal. People were coming to him in droves, confessing their sins and being baptized. In today’s world, he would probably have a popular podcast, maybe a YouTube channel and would have published some books probably. He was a big deal. But he turns the attention to the One who is coming. The humility of preparation is found in our recognition that we are not the big deal. All of these things find their culmination in one thing. In One Person actually. The promise of preparation is found in the comfort of the coming of our Lord Jesus. In Him, the glory of the Lord is revealed, and all flesh will see Him as He is when He returns! The peace of preparation is found in the coming of our Lord Jesus. In Him is the fullness of the goodness and justice of a holy God who has come to us and who promises to return! The discipline of preparation is found in the coming of our Lord Jesus. In Him, we find the patience of God who is not willing that any should perish but that all should have everlasting life in holiness and godliness! The humility of preparation is found in the coming of our Lord Jesus. In Him, we see the fullness of humility, “who being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God: But emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being made in the likeness of men, and in habit found as a man. He humbled himself, becoming obedient unto death, even to the death of the cross. For which cause God also hath exalted him, and hath given him a name which is above all names: That in the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those that are in heaven, on earth, and under the earth: And that every tongue should confess that the Lord Jesus Christ is in the glory of God the Father.” (Philippians 2:6-11, DR) This is the One for whom we wait! This is the One who comes! Prepare the way! Deo gratias!
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There have been a couple of distinct times in my life that I can remember having to “go back.” Let me explain.
Once was in college. I was in the Army ROTC program and a part of the Ranger battalion. As such, one of the things we had to learn was “land nav.” That’s land navigation if you didn’t pick that up. Basically, what that means is we had to learn how, given nothing but a map and an objective, how to get ourselves and our unit from where we were to where we needed to go to accomplish our mission. You had to learn how to read a map and the “lay of the land” in order to do so. Getting lost could have, literally, fatal consequences. Well, I got lost. I was unsure on how to read a compass at the time and how to plot routes to travel from point A to point B. So, rather than ask, I just sucked it up and tried to get it done. And I got lost. My platoon sergeant found me wandering around and said, “Go back to the beginning and start over.” I wasn’t happy about it but I knew I was lost and so I did. The second time was putting that concept of land navigation into practical use during my time as a trainee police officer. I had to learn how to read street maps in order to get from where I was in the city to where I needed to go. Yes, it was long enough ago that we needed physical maps and didn’t have fancy computers or GPS to tell us where to go. Anyways… I got lost more than once. My training officers were not amused with lack of attention and inability to do my job. I remember getting lost once and not knowing where I was. My training officer said, “Then go back to the last place you know and start over.” Sound familiar, right? Sometimes we just have to go back to the beginning and start over. I think this is really apropos for the Church today. I feel like, in many ways, the Church has lost her way. She has become confused and is wandering around lost, trying to find her way from point A to point B, not really sure how to get to where she needs to go to accomplish her mission. I think there are a lot of reasons for this and I really don’t have the time or space to discuss them all. But I do want to touch on one that I believe is really important: Tradition. Specifically, tradition in worship. Some of you reading this were instantly triggered just now when I said tradition and worship. It’s okay, you’ll be fine. Some of you are probably thinking that I talk about this too much and some of you probably don’t care. You should. We should. We should care because our abandonment of tradition is killing the Church. I know that sounds very dramatic, but I want us to consider some things. I base most of this on anecdotal evidence and personal experience. There are some hard facts that I can and probably will quote but, nevertheless. We look around us and lament about how the secular world is so corrupt and lost and blah blah blah. And it is. The secular world is so corrupt and lost and sick that it’s dizzying to watch the pace at which things seem to be disintegrating. But the Church is no different. I mean, if we’re being honest. Ok, so some hard facts first. You can find some of these in Kenneth C. Jones’ work Index of Leading Catholic Indicators: The Church Since Vatican II. In 1958, 74 percent of Catholics attended Sunday Mass. By 2000, that number dropped to 25 percent. In 1965, there were 126,000 adult baptisms. In 2002, there were 80,000 (keep in mind that the population of the world has increased in these years also). In 1965, there were 58,000 priests. In 2002, there were only 45,000 priests. In 1965, there were 1,575 ordinations to the priesthood and in 2002, there were 450 ordinations to the priesthood. In 1965, 1 percent of parishes were without a priest. By 2002, 15 percent of parishes were without a resident priest. These numbers could go on and on. One of the most shocking is found in a 2019 study published by the Pew Research Center that found that only 31 percent of Catholics believe in the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist. Read that again slowly and let it sink in. 69 percent of our brothers and sisters do not believe when Jesus said, “This is my Body” and “This is my Blood,” He meant it. The overwhelming majority of Catholic Christians in the world today do not believe what Jesus Himself taught about the Eucharist. And we wonder what has happened to the Church. To be fair, we are the ones who have allowed this. We, the faithful, are the ones who have not only stood by and quietly went along with the slow decline of the Church, but we have actively participated in it. We are to blame. Jesus hasn’t changed His mind about the Church. The Bible hasn’t changed. God the Father hasn’t changed His mind about how things are to be done, how He is to be worshipped. We have done this. So, what are we to do? To be honest, I think some of this is inevitable. Some of this, I believe, is a purgation of the Church. Some of this God has and is allowing to see who will be faithful. But, other than some of this being God’s doing, most of it is our doing. So, what are we to do? I think the answer going forward is to go back. With all my heart, I believe the way forward in the Church is to go back to the faith once for all delivered to the saints. We need to return to the traditional beliefs and practices of the Church as she has been and done from the beginning. And this is not a mystery. We know how to do this, and we know what must be done. Let’s be honest, we don’t want to. We don’t want to because it will be uncomfortable for us and, truth is, we’re really more about our comfort than we are our holiness. We’re more about the status quo and less about obedience to what Jesus has told us we are to do. We would rather be friends with the world than brothers and sisters of our Lord Jesus. And we wonder what has happened to the Church. Let us return, with humble hearts, to the faith once for all delivered to the saints. Let us return to the worship of Christ’s Church as the saints before us worshipped. Let us jettison our concerns and insecurities about how the world views us and prostrate ourselves before the throne of our Lord and Saviour. Let us beg His mercy. Let us bring our sacrifice of praise in a proper and holy way befitting His majesty. Let us sing and pray along with our forefathers in the faith. Demand it of ourselves and our priests and bishops. Make no mistake; this will not be easy and demands great courage of us. Cry out to those who will listen that we want to be part of the Church as she has always been, not as the world has tried to make her. Sometimes the only way forward is to go back to the beginning. |
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