Homily for the 1st Sunday of Advent

This week, we begin a new Church year with the Season of Advent. This is a season of hope that focuses on the one who changed the course of human history. The season of Advent proclaims the message that God has not abandoned His people.  He sent His Son among us to come to our aid and to free us from our sins.

This holy season celebrates the abiding presence of Christ in our world and His birth in each one of our hearts. This season tells us about the beginning and future ending of the story of our redemption. While we look forward to Christmas and the celebration of the birth of Christ, we cast a glance into the future and to that great day when Christ will come in glory. In the meantime, we are to wait in joyful hope for our LORD and Savior to be revealed.

Echoed and re-echoed throughout the readings is the warning, "Be on your guard, stay awake because you never know when the time will come." The real challenge of Advent is to prepare ourselves for that great moment by letting God's presence and power work in our lives.

Life is incomplete without God, and we are useless and inadequate without God’s presence in our lives. God alone can satisfy our deepest longings and fill us with inner peace. St. Julian of Norwich prays, “God, of your goodness, give me yourself, for you are enough for me, and I can ask for nothing which is less which can pay you full worship. And if I ask for anything else, always I am in want; but in you do I have everything.”[1]

Advent makes us aware of our need to turn to God in hope and humble prayer, begging God to save us. It is a time for soul searching and renewal, for becoming more conscious of our sins and asking for pardon. If we have abandoned God, neglected prayer, or broken the Commandments, now is the time to make a fresh start at building a closer relationship with God. There is not much point in Christ coming into our world if He is not at home and alive in our hearts. God values our response to His love. 

We are invited to listen to the voice of God in the countless ways He speaks to us every day, and we're called upon to recognize and share this love. The challenge of God in Jesus is around every corner — at work or school, on the street, while we are with friends, at home, or in the sometimes-dull routine of daily life. There is never a day when God does not knock at the door of our hearts. Advent is about recognizing the many ways in which, and in many people through whom, God announces Himself in our lives.[2]

 

[1] Julian of Norwich, Showings, 1978, Paulist Press, New York, NY, p. 184.

[2] Desmond Knowles, Voicing A Thought On Sundays, 1991, Columbia Press/ Twenty-Third Publications, Mystic, CT, pp. 138-9.