Homily—4th Sunday in Advent
December 19 & 20, 2009
The question my friends for each of us to ask today on this 4th and last weekend of Advent might be: “Just what is God up to in the Incarnation? We can let this question sit for a bit, and in the mean time, I invite you to think about the anticipation of a long-awaited event—how we feel as we wait in line for a new store opening, the opening night of a new movie or play, the first day of a sale or entrance into a sports event. If you have ever been in such a waiting line, you know of the almost palpable excitement for things to start. That is where we find ourselves today on this 4th Weekend/Sunday of Advent—on the threshold of something great!
The readings today bring together the major themes we have looked at during the season of Advent: promise, repentance, transformation and joy—and now we are on the threshold of entering into that joy. A purely human manifestation for me that we are almost there comes when we put up our Christmas tree and decorate our house. We always do that about a week before Christmas and then, for me at least, we are at the point of having the preparations move into a special place. The quiet waiting is over –the joy is becoming palpable. Soon gifts start to show up under the tree—a manifestation of the felt love of family and friends.
But what is the joy really about? What is God up to in the incarnation? Today’s readings show us clearly that Jesus, the Christ was born into ordinariness, if not abject poverty. He appeared incarnate the first time in a backwater town, Bethlehem, whose only other notable inhabitant up until that time had been David and no one of any import is known to have followed Jesus.
In today’s Gospel, we see Mary, a young maid, going to help her matronly aunt, who like Mary is with child. Nothing unusual here, except for Elizabeth being pregnant in her later years. Young girls would often go and help older family members. But certainly there was more to God’s plan than this.
The two growing babies recognize each other from the sanctuaries of their mothers’ wombs. We catch the excitement through the Gospel words, “When I heard your greeting, my baby leapt in my womb for joy!”
God probably intended that in an unbelieving world where others doubted the truth of what each woman proclaimed, they needed the affirmation of each other to confirm what each knew had happened within her as a response to her faith and trust in a loving God. This is what Mary’s “blessedness” proclaimed by Elizabeth is really all about—her faith and trust in a loving God—and that this same God would be faithful to her.
Another question then that we might ask: why does God choose the ordinary to show us the divine?—perhaps to direct us back to God wherein all is possible; thus in simplicity, we can see greatness. If this is a problem for us, seeing greatness in the simple, the ordinary, maybe the problem is with us in insisting that the divine come in loud and flashy ways, rather than through the ordinary of life: through the administrator of a nursing home, an electrician, a farmer, an educator, a maker of school lunches, a volunteer, a parent, a grandparent, an advocate for women and children, a family caretaker, and the list goes on to include us all.
The readings today insist that the incarnation comes to the most ordinary among us and all that is required on our part is an openness to do God’s will—a willingness to answer God’s call. The reading from the author to the Hebrews states that this willingness to answer God’s call and do God’s will was the motivating force in Jesus’ life.
Jesus is proof that God doesn’t want our sacrifices, holocausts, or sin offerings. What God wants is our open and willing hearts. Such was Mary’s heart in her “yes” to God as was Elizabeth’s in welcoming Mary into her home. In the actions of both of these women, they welcomed into their hearts and into our world, the long-awaited Messiah.
The examples of Jesus, Mary and Elizabeth in our scriptures today should give us a great deal of hope because if we follow their examples, then each loving action we personally do in faith says that the incarnation has taken place—that Jesus lives within us and by extension then—in all of God’s people.
This is why it is such a travesty for us ever, in any of our Catholic churches to deny people access to the Eucharist. We then effectively stop the incarnation from happening in that life. We, each of us, are the conduits for God’s presence to be felt in our world—we have an awesome responsibility to welcome all as evidenced in our scriptures today.
A final point that I think it is important for us to meditate on today, given our scriptures, is the case of Mary and what it was like for her to be found with child in the society in which she lived. Elizabeth addresses her as “blessed among women.” Probably many in her neighborhood, if truth be told, gossiped about her and some even shunned her for what they felt was only too obvious.
It couldn’t have been easy for her—scripture doesn’t tell us—but her family may not have believed her story—Joseph didn’t at first. After all, it was quite a fantastic story when one thinks about it—pregnant by the Spirit of God—carrying the long-awaited Messiah! At the least was the ridicule and shunning. At the worst, a woman could be stoned in the streets for carrying an illegitimate pregnancy.
For all these purely human reasons, part of my Advent ritual each year is to read Marjorie Holmes’ love story of Mary and Joseph—TWO FROM GALILEE, copyright 1972. What she does in this short volume is make human these creatures of faith that have too often been put up on pedestals so that they lose their connection to our humanity. Mary and Joseph, Anna and Joachim, Joseph’s parents, were flesh and blood humans—people of faith, yes, but people who struggled with what faith asked of them in their purely human lives—just like each of us. We all gain hope when we truly try to understand how they struggled to believe that God’s promise would be fulfilled in their lives, for their little town of Nazareth and ultimately for the entire world through their simple “yes.”
Mary wasn’t a remote, supernatural being, but a flesh and blood human that came to be called “blessed” through her willing response to God’s call. We too are “blessed” when, like Mary we believe in God’s promises through all the ups and downs of our lives, which will bring us true happiness and peace.
We stand now on the threshold of something great as we remember at Christmas time once again that divine love became more fully present in our world through Jesus, the Christ. We assure that divine love will continue in our world through our lives.
Every time we try to be more under standing, more merciful, more gentle, more kind, more just; when we strive to see the divine in each other, even the most seemingly wretched among us, then and only then do we incarnate Jesus once again into life.
I believe my friends, this is what God was all about in sending Jesus to begin life in poor and humble surroundings, to live a life that wasn’t about glitz and power, in order that we would know that each of us can be instruments of God’s love, peace and justice in our world. This is what we celebrate each year at Christmas time—the promise and the possibility of love born again into our world.
Kathy Redig
December 19 & 20, 2009
The question my friends for each of us to ask today on this 4th and last weekend of Advent might be: “Just what is God up to in the Incarnation? We can let this question sit for a bit, and in the mean time, I invite you to think about the anticipation of a long-awaited event—how we feel as we wait in line for a new store opening, the opening night of a new movie or play, the first day of a sale or entrance into a sports event. If you have ever been in such a waiting line, you know of the almost palpable excitement for things to start. That is where we find ourselves today on this 4th Weekend/Sunday of Advent—on the threshold of something great!
The readings today bring together the major themes we have looked at during the season of Advent: promise, repentance, transformation and joy—and now we are on the threshold of entering into that joy. A purely human manifestation for me that we are almost there comes when we put up our Christmas tree and decorate our house. We always do that about a week before Christmas and then, for me at least, we are at the point of having the preparations move into a special place. The quiet waiting is over –the joy is becoming palpable. Soon gifts start to show up under the tree—a manifestation of the felt love of family and friends.
But what is the joy really about? What is God up to in the incarnation? Today’s readings show us clearly that Jesus, the Christ was born into ordinariness, if not abject poverty. He appeared incarnate the first time in a backwater town, Bethlehem, whose only other notable inhabitant up until that time had been David and no one of any import is known to have followed Jesus.
In today’s Gospel, we see Mary, a young maid, going to help her matronly aunt, who like Mary is with child. Nothing unusual here, except for Elizabeth being pregnant in her later years. Young girls would often go and help older family members. But certainly there was more to God’s plan than this.
The two growing babies recognize each other from the sanctuaries of their mothers’ wombs. We catch the excitement through the Gospel words, “When I heard your greeting, my baby leapt in my womb for joy!”
God probably intended that in an unbelieving world where others doubted the truth of what each woman proclaimed, they needed the affirmation of each other to confirm what each knew had happened within her as a response to her faith and trust in a loving God. This is what Mary’s “blessedness” proclaimed by Elizabeth is really all about—her faith and trust in a loving God—and that this same God would be faithful to her.
Another question then that we might ask: why does God choose the ordinary to show us the divine?—perhaps to direct us back to God wherein all is possible; thus in simplicity, we can see greatness. If this is a problem for us, seeing greatness in the simple, the ordinary, maybe the problem is with us in insisting that the divine come in loud and flashy ways, rather than through the ordinary of life: through the administrator of a nursing home, an electrician, a farmer, an educator, a maker of school lunches, a volunteer, a parent, a grandparent, an advocate for women and children, a family caretaker, and the list goes on to include us all.
The readings today insist that the incarnation comes to the most ordinary among us and all that is required on our part is an openness to do God’s will—a willingness to answer God’s call. The reading from the author to the Hebrews states that this willingness to answer God’s call and do God’s will was the motivating force in Jesus’ life.
Jesus is proof that God doesn’t want our sacrifices, holocausts, or sin offerings. What God wants is our open and willing hearts. Such was Mary’s heart in her “yes” to God as was Elizabeth’s in welcoming Mary into her home. In the actions of both of these women, they welcomed into their hearts and into our world, the long-awaited Messiah.
The examples of Jesus, Mary and Elizabeth in our scriptures today should give us a great deal of hope because if we follow their examples, then each loving action we personally do in faith says that the incarnation has taken place—that Jesus lives within us and by extension then—in all of God’s people.
This is why it is such a travesty for us ever, in any of our Catholic churches to deny people access to the Eucharist. We then effectively stop the incarnation from happening in that life. We, each of us, are the conduits for God’s presence to be felt in our world—we have an awesome responsibility to welcome all as evidenced in our scriptures today.
A final point that I think it is important for us to meditate on today, given our scriptures, is the case of Mary and what it was like for her to be found with child in the society in which she lived. Elizabeth addresses her as “blessed among women.” Probably many in her neighborhood, if truth be told, gossiped about her and some even shunned her for what they felt was only too obvious.
It couldn’t have been easy for her—scripture doesn’t tell us—but her family may not have believed her story—Joseph didn’t at first. After all, it was quite a fantastic story when one thinks about it—pregnant by the Spirit of God—carrying the long-awaited Messiah! At the least was the ridicule and shunning. At the worst, a woman could be stoned in the streets for carrying an illegitimate pregnancy.
For all these purely human reasons, part of my Advent ritual each year is to read Marjorie Holmes’ love story of Mary and Joseph—TWO FROM GALILEE, copyright 1972. What she does in this short volume is make human these creatures of faith that have too often been put up on pedestals so that they lose their connection to our humanity. Mary and Joseph, Anna and Joachim, Joseph’s parents, were flesh and blood humans—people of faith, yes, but people who struggled with what faith asked of them in their purely human lives—just like each of us. We all gain hope when we truly try to understand how they struggled to believe that God’s promise would be fulfilled in their lives, for their little town of Nazareth and ultimately for the entire world through their simple “yes.”
Mary wasn’t a remote, supernatural being, but a flesh and blood human that came to be called “blessed” through her willing response to God’s call. We too are “blessed” when, like Mary we believe in God’s promises through all the ups and downs of our lives, which will bring us true happiness and peace.
We stand now on the threshold of something great as we remember at Christmas time once again that divine love became more fully present in our world through Jesus, the Christ. We assure that divine love will continue in our world through our lives.
Every time we try to be more under standing, more merciful, more gentle, more kind, more just; when we strive to see the divine in each other, even the most seemingly wretched among us, then and only then do we incarnate Jesus once again into life.
I believe my friends, this is what God was all about in sending Jesus to begin life in poor and humble surroundings, to live a life that wasn’t about glitz and power, in order that we would know that each of us can be instruments of God’s love, peace and justice in our world. This is what we celebrate each year at Christmas time—the promise and the possibility of love born again into our world.
Kathy Redig
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