2nd Sunday of Advent, Year C (2024) – Homily

2^nd Sunday of Advent, Year C
Baruch 5:1-9
Psalm 126:1-2, 2-3, 4-5, 6 (3)
Philippians 1:4-6, 8-11
Luke 3:1-6
December 8, 2024

How do you feel about the world today?

There is war in the Middle East.  There is war in Ukraine and Russia.

There are political threats and rebellions in other nations

There is a lot of polarization in our nation.

There is immorality.

One might feel like mourning in misery.

What might God say to that?

God doesn’t approve of these things anymore than we might.  As to what God might say about the state of the world today, I think of what He said to the Israelites in exile, “Jerusalem, take off your robe of mourning and misery, put on the splendor of glory from God forever.”

The Israelites mourned in misery because they had been defeated by Babylon and many taken away in exile.  God is telling them that He has a future full of hope planned for them (see Jeremiah 29:11). 

The present condition of the world in not great.  On our own, we might see the cup as half-empty (or worse).  With God, there is always hope. 

When we trust in God, and when I say trust, I mean actually letting God change our lives and to actually do what He asks, He wraps us in a “cloak of justice.”  On the day of our Baptism, we are marked with the Sign of the Cross on our forehead.  We are named as a child of God forever. 

But we still have to choose each and every day to live as a child of God.  This means keeping all his commands, even if we think something else is more pleasurable.

As individuals and as a society, we are led away from God by Satan.  When we truly hand our lives over to God, asking him to change us, He will bring us back to him.

Perhaps the hardest part for us about this is that it means we may not get to do what we want.  Actually, it may mean changing what we want. 

The prophet Baruch says God will make “every lofty mountain” low.  Did we create the mountain that stands in our way?  Then, we need to change.

Did we create the gorges by our sins?  God can fix that with his mercy and justice.

We lament at the present state of the world.  It may bring tears to our eyes, but, if we submit our lives to God and let him work through us to change the world, God can make things better and we will be “filled with joy.”

People often seek an oasis of this world.  By this I mean material wealth and prestige.  John the Baptist did not.  He lived in the desert. 

It is when we let going of worldly things and place ourselves in the desert that we can find the true oasis that is the faith, mercy, and justice that God offers us.

John the Baptist fulfills the words delivered by Isaiah of one who will be a voice “crying out in the desert.”  Knowing these words of the Lord are fulfilled gives us hope.  Seeing prophecies fulfilled in the birth and ministry of Jesus, gives us hope.  Jesus comes to restore all things and to make straight the path.  God makes all things right…if we let him.

Yes, we have to let him.  God doesn’t force his Will on us.  Perhaps He should because we seem to mess things up when we act on our own. 

Why doesn’t God force his way on those who act against his will?

Because He loves us and wants us to be able to love.  To love, we must have free will.  Love requires a choice. 

Actually, our choices reveal what we love.  We choose what we love.  We do well to seek God’s love for us and to choose to love him in response.  Money, prestige, and worldly ways do not offer you love.

In his love, God offers us hope.  His hope is much needed. 

Perhaps you are aware that every 25 years our Catholic Church celebrates a jubilee year.  We will be a new jubilee in a couple of weeks.  Knowing how the world is today, Pope Francis has called this jubilee to be a time of focusing on hope (see my blog article, “We Need Hope Part I”).

Paul writes to the Philippians about his prayer for them.  Please know that I pray for each one of you for, like Paul, “I am confident of this, that the one who began a good work in you will continue to complete it.”

You just have to let him.  And so I pray, again like Paul, “that your love may increase ever more and more, in knowledge and every kind of perception, to discern what is of value.”

What is of real value?  God’s love.  Take the hope that God has given you and make it the center of your life.  Then let God work to change the world through you.