2nd Sunday of Advent (Fr. Simham)

by | Dec 7, 2019

WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR? OR PREPARING FOR?

We are in the season of Advent. Advent is a season of waiting or longing. There are two ways or types of waiting.

  1. You write your exams and you wait for the result. Here you can do nothing much about it. Already your fate or result is fixed and you await to accept it.
  2. There is another type of waiting. You have a speech competition of singing competition tomorrow and you wait for it. Here there is no passive waiting. There is active waiting. What do I mean? A competitor who is waiting for the competition does not wait passively. He practices and get himself ready to succeed in the coming competition.

Now if Advent is a time of waiting and longing I ask what type of waiting is this?. Is it a passive waiting or active waiting? To answer this question we need to first answer another question.

That is: What are we waiting for in this season of Advent?

Is it for that Christmas day party when we can have nice turkey and a bottle of wine.

Or is it for celebrating the birth of our Savior and Lord at the midnight mass with all devotion and piety.

What are we waiting for? All these things are good. But our waiting is for something more than that. We wait for something which is more than a party and a celebration. In today’s first reading Prophet Isaiah tell us about what we are waiting for. We are waiting for messianic times to come. That is When Messiah comes how the world order will be. It will be a changed world. Not the same as we see it now. This is beautifully described by Prophet Isaiah in today’s first reading (Is.11/6-9). We are waiting for a time when wolf will dwell in peace with the lamb, the leopard shall lie down with the kid, the calf and the lion and the fatling together, and a little child shall lead them. (Isaiah 11:6) go further and read up to verse 9.

“Impossible,” some people will say on reading this. “He is dreaming. The wolf can never live in peace with the lamb because it is in the nature of the wolf to eat the lamb.” But that is exactly the point. Just as it is impossible, naturally speaking, for the wolf to live in peace with the lamb, so it is impossible for us to live the life of harmonious coexistence in the new world order as envisioned by Isaiah and all the prophets. A radical transformation of our human nature is required. We need a completely new heart. This is what John the Baptist is calling for in the Gospel. This radical transformation of human nature is possible only by God’s grace.

Grace transforms nature. God’s grace transforms human nature so radically that one needs to experience it to believe it. Grace working in nature accomplishes so much more than we could ever imagine. What Isaiah is fore seeing in Messianic times is a transformation of attitude. The philosopher Thomas Hobbes describing about human relationships says “Homo Homini Lupus” Man is a wolf to another man. What is required is Homo Homini philius attitude. Man is a brother another man. We are no longer threat to each other. In another place that is in chapter 2/2-4 Isaiah says nation will not lift up sword against another nation. They shall turn their swords into pruning hooks.” This is the new world order that is envisioned by Isaiah in Messianic times. It is this we long for and wait. Our advent is for this. A world order where a fellow man or nation is no longer a threat to another man or nation. A world with live and let live attitude

Now let me go back to the first question I asked. What type of waiting is our waiting this advent. Passive or active? It is not passive waiting but active waiting. It is not we waiting passively for God to do something to change the world order. But it is we who need to co-operate with the grace of God to bring this change or transformation or metanoia. You and me may not achieve it in one season or in one generation, but let us play our part. Let us try not to be a wolf to another man. Let us try our best to be a loving brother and friend to our neighbor. Let us live and let others live. Let us change first and believe that the world will automatically change.

Fr. Showreelu Simham