We have about a week and a half left! Advent is almost over, and Christmas is almost here. So how is your preparation for Christmas faring? Are you feeling good? Is your prep helping others be good? Or, has it involved a lot of entertaining, shopping, decorating, traveling, cooking, etc. Do you need a little peace in the mist of all the hectic things cluttering your calendar. So do I.
Just as election season ended a few weeks ago, our holiday season began. While election season is over, it seems we bring into our holiday prep the stress and anxiety it offered. Perhaps you, like me, sense that we often prepare for and celebrate Christmas doing the opposite of what brings peace and joy to the world. All this stuff blinds us to the message of the season. Maybe we embrace too much of the secular culture and not enough of the Gospel culture. Are we are able to listen to God in the midst of all this?
What is the real reason for Advent? In the Catholic Church, the Advent season reminds us about the importance of Christ in our lives now, prepares us to celebrate Christ’s birth at Christmas, and refers us to his second coming at a future time. Catholics consider all three comings when we celebrate Advent. Traditionally, we should focus more on prayer through this period.
I encourage you in these few remaining days of Advent to pray in a different way. How? Do as the Pope Francis challenged all Americans. When he addressed the U.S. Congress in the fall of 2015, he highlighted three Americans for us to study: Martin Luther King, Jr., Fr. Thomas Merton, and Dorothy Day. Each of these 20th-century pilgrims took time to prayerfully and critically analyze what is right and what is wrong with our way of life (in America). These amazing figures acted on what they noticed. Studying their lives, we have learned they each saw how the Gospel applies to a nation that prides itself on military strength, higher profits, efficiency, material comforts, possessions, and self-sufficiency while ignoring and devaluing the weak and marginalized. These American values run counter to Jesus’ message of humility, sharing, serving, listening, non-violence, poverty, respecting God’s time, sacrifice, and total trust in God.
As I prayed, I realized that on my Advent journey, I have been soaking in a culture that is opposite of real peace and joy. Advent reminds me, I need Jesus NOW. I repeat, we have about a week and a half left! Like King, Merton and Day did, lets make space and deeply reflect on the call Jesus gives us in our culture, our Gospel culture. It is a call to “help make the world a place where it is easier for people to be good” (Dorothy Day’s words).
God Bless,
Fr. J.J.