December 1, 2024 Essay: Embrace Advent
Happy New Year! A new liturgical year has begun with the season of Advent. With all things Christmas already crying out for our attention, it is hard to give Advent our full attention.
In Advent, we look back while also looking forward. We look back to the remarkable truth that God entered human history in the person of Jesus. This truth is magnified in its wonder by the corresponding truth that God chose to enter human history through the person of Mary; a young woman of absolutely no significance. Yet, Mary heard the call of God to her, wrestled with that call, and then gave her assent to that call so that the great work of salvation could be accomplished through the Son she would bear. Reflecting back on these twin truths, we have occasion to ponder the depth of God’s love for us. God chose to enter fully into our humanity, sharing in all aspects of our humanity save for sin so that we might one day share in God’s own divinity. As we ponder God’s great love for us, we also reflect upon Mary’s remarkable faith and trust in God. Nothing prevents us from following Mary’s example. We simply need to do as she did. We need to enter into a living relationship with God in which we come to experience the immense love of God for us so that it makes sense for us to say “Yes” to whatever God asks of us because we know that God cannot fail us.
Let me offer two prayers to keep us focused on this Advent season.
Good and gracious God, how remarkable is your love for me! How is it that you would choose to enter our humanity for my sake in the desire that I might one day share in your own divinity? In this Advent season, keep my heart attentive to all the ways you manifest your love for me daily and help me live in a way that others will experience in me your immense love for them.
Beloved Mary. Thank you for saying, “Yes,” to God and so becoming the mother of our Savior. Help me to give God the attention that you gave to God that I might hear God’s voice calling forth the good from me. Help me to grow in faithfulness to your Son this Advent season so that I can commemorate his birth with a joyful heart and anticipate his coming for me with gladness and thanksgiving.
As our prayer to Mary reminds us, Advent is also a time to prepare ourselves for when Jesus will return at the end of history; the end of our personal histories, our deaths, and the end of this world. Are we striving each day to embody in our lives the values of Jesus Christ? Are we persons of compassion whose compassion embraces all and excludes none? Do we strive to offer mercy and forgiveness to all? Where such forgiveness is difficult for us, do we seek the grace of Jesus to heal our wounds and so free us to forgive? Do we desire the well-being of all persons without exception which is the love Jesus commands us to have for all persons? Are we making every day a little Christmas as Jesus becomes incarnate in the world through us? If so, then we have nothing to fear as we anticipate the end of our history, as we will simply be swept up into the everlasting love of Jesus.
A third Advent prayer could be this:
Jesus, help me to remember the blessing it is to be your incarnation each day in all that I say and do. May others encounter in me what I have encountered in you; a love that is merciful and compassionate. May my death be my Bethlehem; my being born into your everlasting love.
Blessed Advent!
— Fr. Mark C. Hallinan, S.J., Associate Pastor