3rd Sunday of Advent
Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP
OLR, NOLA
After
so many months of bad news for the national and international Church,
it's about time we rehearse some of the basics of the faith. I don't
mean basic doctrines or moral precepts but the even more fundamental
attitudes and dispositions that our status as heirs to the Kingdom
should provoke in us. Even as we contend with scandal, betrayal,
persecution, and trial, our best hope for surviving and growing in
holiness is to remain joyful. Paul writes to the Philippians,
“Rejoice in the Lord always. I shall say it again: rejoice! [. . .]
The Lord is near. Have no anxiety at all. . .” What is there to
rejoice about? Is Paul aware of what's being going in the Church
lately? Does he know about the confusion, the secrets, the
backstabbing and abuse? Does he know about the declining number of
regular Mass-goers? Doesn't he know we have a priest shortage and
that the number of sisters and nuns are in a free-fall? No, he
doesn't. He wrote to the Philippians from prison while under the
threat of the death penalty for preaching Christ. From prison.
Preparing to die. For preaching Christ. Paul says, “Rejoice in the
Lord always. I shall say it again: rejoice! The Lord is near!”
Why
should we rejoice in the middle of this mess? Because the Lord is
near. He's near to being born on Christmas Day, and he is near to
coming again as our Just Judge, and he is near to us in the Blessed
Sacrament, and he is near in one another as the Church. He is never
far away. And we rejoice b/c – whatever the world throws our way,
whatever disaster we face – we are his brothers and sisters, heirs
to the Father's Kingdom. The proper attitude toward our situation
–whatever that situation might be – is always joyfulness. Thomas
Aquinas teaches us that joy is an effect of love. When one loves the
result is joy. To experience joy and share that joy is a sign not
only that we are loved but also that we love in turn. And I want to
be clear here: I'm not talking about love and joy in worldly terms –
warm fuzzies and butterflies and being goofy and giggly all the time.
When we love, truly love, we love within the Love Who is God Himself.
We participate in the divine nature of God Who is Love. Our joy,
then, is what happens when we love as God loves us. Sometimes divine
love looks like the creation of the universe. Sometimes it looks like
Christ on a cross. What's the effect? Joy. Our joy at being saved
from the darkness of sin and eternal death.
When
Paul tells the Philippians to rejoice and to rejoice always, he also
tells them to pray with thanksgiving “so that the peace of God that
surpasses all understanding [may] guard [our] hearts and minds in
Christ Jesus.” What are our hearts and minds being guarded against?
Anxiety. Hopeless expectation. Despair. Praying in thanksgiving
guards against those attitudes and dispositions that lead us to
surrender our inheritance in exchange for. . .well, nothing. Nothing
at all. Is your place at the Wedding Feast worth a life of anger? A
life of disappointment and despair? The third Sunday of Advent serves
as the Church's way of bringing our hearts and minds back to their
most basic orientation: we are heirs, children, brothers and sisters,
and nothing this world – or anyone in the Church – can do
anything to change that. . .if
we rejoice and rejoice always! So
long as there is joy, there is love causing that joy. And whatever
scandal or deception or crime that pops up must be seen through the
eyes of joy. This
too will pass.
But God's love and our joy never will. We can thwart the Devil by
giving God thanks for our trials. Has there been a perfect time for
us to practice forgiveness? To show the world God's mercy? To love
radically in the face of the Devil's best efforts to tempt us into
self-righteous anger and despair?
God's prophet, Zephaniah, says,
“The Lord, your God, is in your midst, a mighty savior; he will
rejoice over you with gladness, and renew you in his love, he will
sing joyfully because of you. . .” God is with us. He rejoices at
our rejoicing. And He sings joyfully b/c we belong to Him. Nothing
and no one can spoil this joy. Nothing and no one can turn our joy
into mourning. As we wait on the Christ Child at Christmas and the
Just Judge at the end of the age, we pray with thanksgiving; we ask
and we receive; we rejoice and we love. And we sing with Psalmist: “I
am confident and unafraid. My strength and my courage is the Lord!”
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