November 30 – First Sunday of Advent
Advent is the phase of the Liturgical Year “especially devoted to recollection, to a discreet compunction, and to the thrilling hope of the great joy that the birth of the Messiah will bring. Thus, everyone prepared to welcome the Child-God who, in the virginal maternal sanctuary, drew closer, day by day, to the blessed moment when He would begin His salvific dwelling with humanity.”1
The Church desires that we prepare ourselves duly for this sublime moment, purging habits and customs not in keeping with Christian life.
The Liturgy of this First Sunday of Advent seems to seek to literally shake us from the lethargy into which humanity is progressively sinking. “It is the hour now for you to awake from sleep” (Rom 13:11), St. Paul exclaims. Do you not see that “the day is at hand” (Rom 13:12)?
What day? The day of reckoning! And so that there are no excuses or doubts about what to do, he declares: “not in orgies and drunkenness, not in promiscuity and lust, not in rivalry and jealousy” (Rom 13:13b). Oh! How our era needs to hear these truths!
However, the Apostle of the Gentiles’ warning seems to fall on deaf ears. Indeed, in every age the carefree and optimistic abound…
Carefree were those who, before the deluge, as Our Lord recalls in this Sunday’s Gospel, “were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage” (Mt 24:38), without heeding God’s call to conversion. Fools! Soon Noah would enter the ark, the doors would be closed, and curtains of water would cover the heavens, flooding the earth. Their unbridled desire to enjoy life caused them to rapidly lose what they held dearest. The greater good had been foolishly sacrificed for fleeting pleasure.
The Son of Man will visit us in the near or distant future. When? We do not know. Of one thing, however, we are certain: He will come when we least expect Him…
In reality, knowing the day of the Lord’s coming matters little. The crucial question that comes to mind is: will I be prepared for this encounter? Will I be saved, or not? A decisive question, that makes anyone who honestly seeks God tremble.
If I am not concerned about what should most concern me – my salvation – I am no different from those optimists of Noah’s time! “Our natural propensity is to believe that we are secure on this earth forever and, as a result, to ignore that we live here in a state of trial.”2
“Let us” then, “conduct ourselves properly” (Rom 13:13a) to not be caught off guard when the Son of Man comes. To this end, let us begin now – not tomorrow – our process of conversion. And if, by chance, our conscience accuses us of something, we should hasten to seek pardon. Let us clothe ourselves with Jesus Christ, and place ourselves in the most pure hands of her who is the Mother of Mercy. And let us enter the Ark of the Holy Church forever, where it will always be day! ◊
Notes
1 CORRÊA DE OLIVEIRA, Plinio. No “crepúsculo” do Sol de Justiça [In the “twilight” of the Sun of Justice]. In: Folha de São Paulo. São Paulo. Year LVII. No.18.170 – Jan. 1, 1979), p.3.
2 CLÁ DIAS, EP, João Scognamiglio. Vigilance: A Forgotten Virtue? In: New Insights on the Gospels. Città del Vaticano-Nobleton: LEV; Heralds of the Gospel, 2013, v.I, p.18.
