This is the time of year when it seems that everyone sings of peace on earth and good will toward all! Pope Paul VI proclaimed that if we want peace we need to work for justice. In this season of dreams of peace and good will…we are called to work for justice! Advent is a strange season…a season of hopes and dreams…a season of promises fulfilled and of promises yet to be fulfilled…a season of the Reign of God, that which is bursting forth and at the same time not yet fully here. Advent is counter cultural on so many levels…in a season when it seems the whole world begins to spin ever faster we are called to slow down…to spend time in prayer and reflection…to spend time thinking about the deeper realities of our lives.

Part of this season’s story is about a young girl living in a male dominated world where women were treated as property, but she breaks free from the bonds of obscurity and insignificance and becomes the heroine. A young girl named Mary said “yes” to an impossible proposition…”yes” to what must have seemed totally absurd. Imagine yourself in Mary’s place…a heavenly visitor telling you that God her/himself, The Creator of all things…visible and invisible…was “asking” her to be the mother of the long awaited Messiah. The whole idea that God would choose to become human, one like us, and enter into our world as a vulnerable and innocent child is almost too much to comprehend. And yet she said “yes”…and her yes changed the world forever! To this very day…right now…her yes is still changing the world because the Risen Christ is in our midst! Because of her yes we can profess “we are the Body of Christ!” What is God calling me to say yes to as a member of the Body of Christ? Am I willing to risk, like Mary, and say “yes” to God not knowing where it will lead me…just trusting that God will walk with me on the journey? As I say yes to God, who am I being called to journey with?

Advent Blessings,
Fr Tim

This Sunday we light the pink candle on the Advent wreath...it is meant to mark the week as special…for centuries, in the west, the color pink has been associated with “joy”! This Sunday is called “Gaudete” Sunday…from the Latin “to rejoice”…for the Lord is near! The readings this Sunday have both a sense of expectancy and joyfulness. Isaiah tells us that the desert will break forth in bloom and we will see the splendor of God and the weak and the fearful of heart will be made strong. The blind will see, the deaf will hear and mute will sing…all the ransomed will return and there will be gladness and joy among the throngs of people as they enter Zion. Wow…what a vision of the Reign of God bursting forth on the earth! As we think about this vision of the Reign of God, and we look around at all the suffering and war and famine and injustices…our joyfulness can quickly turn to sadness and feelings of being cheated out of Isaiah’s vision of the Reign of God.

OR, instead of feeling cheated or sorry for myself, I can stand up and work to make that vision a reality. I can work to build up the Reign of God in the midst of the injustices and fear and violence by speaking out and standing up on behalf of the homeless, the immigrant, people of color, women, Jews, Muslims, members of the LGBT community, many of whom feel fearful and despised because of who they are and where they come from. Each one of us is called to be the voice of the prophet crying out in a wilderness, to lay down our weapons of war and destruction and to build the peaceable kingdom. As we reflect on “Gaudete Sunday” and its meaning let us commit to joyfully building up the Reign of God. What will I do this week to build up the Reign of God? Who will I stand with this week as I “prepare the way of the Lord”?

Advent Blessings,
Fr Tim

REPENT! Prepare the way of the Lord! These words of John the Baptist echo down through the centuries…and are as pertinent to us as they were to those who first heard them. John came from the desert crying out to the people, calling them to a moment of “metanoia”…literally “a turning around”. The Voice of John the Baptist cries out to us in the midst of the rush and chaos of the Advent season, calling us to a conversion of heart. He announces the breaking forth of the Reign of God in our very midst. But can we hear him amid the cacophony and the clamor of our busy and overscheduled lives? I think not…not unless we are willing to step back, to sit down and to spend a moment reflecting on our lives and our relationships. We need to ask ourselves if we are “living” our discipleship.

The Scriptures for this Sunday speak of a new time for the people of Israel, a time of great hope…a new reign that is breaking forth. In this new world, mercy and justice will flourish and the wicked and unjust ones will be banished forever. But as we look around it seems as if we are a long way off from the “peaceable kingdom”. Wars rage and political unrest swirl around us like the biting winds of a cold December night. Millions of our sisters and brothers desperately seek refuge, with no home in sight. Terrorists strike the innocent and fill us with fear…it all seems so bleak. Where is the Reign of God bursting forth?

It is waiting to burst forth from within each one of us! The Reign of God burst forth every time we respond to a person or a situation in a Christ-like manner. Are we brave enough to “turn around” to answer the call of John the Baptist…to allow the love of God to soften our hearts and enlighten our minds? As Christians are we willing to really “live” the Reign of God through our daily actions? What would that look like…what would I have to change in my life for me to be a living sign to others of the bursting forth of the Reign of God in the midst of a fearful and wounded world?

Advent Blessings,
Fr Tim