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With Christmas just around the corner, I find myself thinking of my children and grandchildren, and how they view Christmas as a time of surprises. As a child, I was the same, and it doesn’t take much to carry me back to my own childhood. These days I can hardly remember what I did last week, but recall everything from 70 years ago.
In my family the surprises began after Mass on the first Sunday of Advent. Mom would hang up advent calendars, and for the next four weeks, each morning we’d get to open one of the little windows and be surprised by what was behind it. I suppose it was a far simpler time; perhaps we were simpler children back then.
We
lived in New York, so we prayed for surprise snowfalls. How great it was to wake
up to a world transformed by a thick white blanket.
Every year Dad surprised us with a huge Christmas tree, anywhere from 12 to 18 feet high. We had a circular stairway, so we had a place that could handle a large tree. But a tree like that was expensive, so Dad would wait until about a week before Christmas when the dealers would sell it at half price. Every year, just when we thought we’d never get a tree, Dad would arrive with an enormous tree tied to the roof of the Oldsmobile.
Mom decorated the house with all sorts of wonderful things. Many had been in
the family for generations. It was always the same, but a surprise,
nonetheless.
And
I can still remember my surprise when my parents decided I was old enough to
attend Midnight Mass. I was probably seven or eight years old, but that first year I fell asleep in the pew during
Monsignor Deagan’s Christmas homily.
Of course, there was Christmas morning, and the opening of the presents…and not just our own. We loved watching our parents’ surprise as they opened the remarkably useless gifts we had given them.
Yes, Christmas has always been a time of surprises, and rightly so, because the Incarnation itself was God’s surprise gift to humanity. We see this manifested in the Old Testament in some of the earliest hints, the prophecies, of a Messiah.
Today's first reading is a perfect example. There we encounter King Ahaz, not one of Judah’s better kings, for he always chose political expediency over faith in God. The prophet Isaiah, more than a little upset with Ahaz, tossed this gem of a prophecy at him and us:
“…the virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall name him Emmanuel.”
Talk about surprises! A virgin bearing a son! What did the people think of that? We don’t know, but we can guess. And that name: Emmanuel! God is with us! What could that mean?
We
find out when we turn to our Gospel passage and encounter Matthew’s wonderful narrative,
as St. Joseph ponders how to handle this rather inconvenient situation
regarding Mary’s pregnancy.
In those days a Jewish marriage consisted of three elements: engagement, betrothal, and marriage. Marital relations were not permitted until marriage. Joseph and Mary were still betrothed, a period that often lasted a year, so Mary’s pregnancy was a problem. If exposed, the punishment for her would be severe. So, Joseph, this “righteous” man, decided to divorce her quietly.
And that’s when God steps in and sends an angel to explain it all to Joseph and command him:
"Joseph, son of David, do not be
afraid to take Mary your wife into your home. For it is through the Holy Spirit
that this child has been conceived in her. She will bear a son and you are to
name him Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins."
Three brief sentences that tell Joseph all he needs to know. And what a surprise that must have been. But it’s a surprise of fulfillment. To ensure we understand that this child, this Son of Mary and the Holy Spirit, is the promised Messiah, Matthew repeats God’s prophecy to Isaiah:
“Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a
son, and they shall name him Emmanuel.”
And Joseph?
“He did as the angel of the Lord had
commanded him and took his wife into his home.”
Joseph, this Son of David, is called to be like
a father to this child of God. As usual, Paul says it best; like all of us,
Joseph is:
“...called
to be holy…called to belong to Jesus Christ.”
As a righteous man of faith, Joseph obeys. And in doing so epitomizes the words of St. Paul to the Romans: Joseph defines “the obedience of faith.” I think sometimes we forget that our faith calls us to obedience. If you and I claim to believe, but don’t obey God’s Word, then, at best, our faith is shallow and weak and joyless, overshadowed by shame and regret.
Indeed, the joy of Christmas begins with Emmanuel, God’s great surprise to the world: “God is with us.” He becomes one of us. He takes on our humanity. It’s God’s a terrible desire to "be with us," to be part of the human condition: God with us in our entirety. With this, He gives our bodies a divine dignity…and that, sisters and brothers, should give us great joy.
Sadly, in today’s world far too many people live joyless lives. As I've discovered in my years of ministry, the most joyless of these are not the poor, but those who are among the most affluent. Having so much, they can’t understand why they aren’t happy.
Back in the seventies the wife of a friend just upped and left him and their children, saying that she had to “find herself.” There was a lot of that going on back then – and it’s still going on today – men and women leaving their families in search of something else, presumably something better.
I’ve always found that a bit odd – people going off in search of themselves, when what they really seek is right there in front of them and within them. They search for meaning but look in all the wrong places.
St. Teresa of Avila, whose works are certainly worth reading, made a point of teaching that it is only in the search for God that we can uncover and discover our own true selves. As Christians, we believe no one can encounter himself until and unless he encounters Jesus Christ.
But who is this Jesus? Is He God? Is He man? Is He both? Do we accept or reject Him as the Way, the Truth, and the Life? Do we acknowledge Jesus as Emmanuel, the Incarnate Word of God? Our answers determine both our entire worldview and how we view ourselves; for once we accept Jesus for who He is, those identity crises disappear.
When we find ourselves through Jesus, and in Jesus, He becomes the very center of our being. It’s then we begin to experience the distance between who we are and who we’re called to be. And who exactly are we called to be?
Paul tells us, just as he told the Romans: We “are called to belong to Jesus Christ…called to be holy.” Why? Because “we have received the grace of apostleship.”
Yes, indeed, like the apostles, we have been called and sent. But sent to do what? Listen to the liturgy. In a few moments Father will pray these words in today’s Preface to the Eucharistic Payer:
“It is by His gift that already we rejoice…so that He may find us watchful in prayer and exultant in His praise.”
Are we doing that? As individuals, as a
Catholic community here at St. Vincent de Paul, are we “watchful in prayer
and exultant in His praise?”
So many around us have yet to know the deep joy of becoming whole in Christ. A few years ago, Pope Francis wrote,
“The joy of the Gospel
fills the hearts and lives of all who encounter Jesus.”
We can encounter Jesus because the Messiah has already come. And yet we still wait, don’t we? Jesus is present and working through His Body, the Church, and He will come again in glory, but He must still come more fully into each of our lives.
Jesus heals. Jesus cleanses. Jesus forgives. Jesus brings back to life that which was dead. Jesus brings good news to those who despair.
Do we share our joy, and live our Christian vocation as St. Joseph did, living the “obedience of faith?” We’re called to prepare the way for Jesus to come into our hearts and the hearts of others, so they, too, may "experience the joy of salvation", the healing, wholeness and holiness we all long for and which alone give real meaning to our lives.
What will be the message others receive about your life and mine? Do our lives bring hope to others? Will our lives, our voices, open their ears to the Word of God? Do we offer them the light of Christ, the light of hope that helps the spiritually blind see, the light that reveals the presence of God’s salvation in our lives? Will you and I carry Jesus to the ostracized, the cast-offs, the forgotten?
Go to the nursing homes, the soup kitchens and food pantries, the shelters. Go to your neighbors, the ones who are alone, who are ill and forgotten. Bring hope where there is despair. Bring the good news to those who hear so much bad news. Put all that is hurting, stained, and impoverished, and lay it at Our Lord’s feet. He’ll pick it up, so nothing will come between us and Jesus Christ.
Only the love of Christ brings true healing. This is our vocation: to be healers and prophets, to pave the way for Jesus Christ in the world…like a continual Advent. Advent and Christmas are a time of surprising gifts. Include Emmanuel, Jesus Christ, among the gifts you take to others.
Blessed are those who are not
disappointed in us.
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