Second Week of Advent

Webmaster • December 5, 2020

Our Readings place the adult John before us both this weekend and next, to block our view of the ‘baby Jesus,’ and thus remind us that the Advent - Christmas mystery is less about the child and more about the adult ‘Coming One’ and the mystery of his life, death, and resurrection that he offers us as our own mystery. We are called to make our own way to the Jordan with the hopeful and curious crowds to see this wild man. John had accepted the hospitality that the desert had offered him. Crunching on the desert food of bitter locusts sweetened with wild honey, he is satisfied with the food of the poor; clad in rough camel hair, he is dressed like Elijah (2 Kings 1:5-8); tempered in his spirit by solitude, John in his turn, welcomes the crowd with a bittersweet message in sparse words honed to a fine cutting edge for slicing through consciences and exposing them to the truth.

Son of a priest though he may be, John does not deliver his message in the Temple or anywhere else in Jerusalem, but on the banks of the Jordan River. At this busy crossing place, so significant in the history of Israel’s journey into the Promised Land (Joshua 3), John urges the people to cross over into God’s forgiveness through the waters of a ritual baptism of repentance. He invites us, too, to honest mindfulness of the water

- not of the Jordan, but of our baptism - and an examination of our consciousness about our fidelity to the Christ into whom we are baptised. Despite the crowds he draws, John’s self-evaluation has nothing of self-exaltation. At this high point of his popularity he speaks directly to the people pointing them away from himself to the stronger One who is coming, and declares that he is unworthy even to bend down and untie the sandals on the feet of this Coming One.

In the Puerto Rican city of San Juan, named after John, there is a huge stone sculpture of the precursor. It is located between the ocean and a main highway of this busy modern city. With the relentlessness of the stone from which he is carved, the Baptist stands with head bent and eyes looking down the highway. But one arm is raised high with a determined finger pointing to heaven. The statue expresses the gospel paradox of John the Baptist, the earthy man of both the wilderness and the Jordan crowds, and the heaven-directed prophet; paradox of disengagement and engagement - and so the embodiment of the paradox of the Advent season. Day after day, as surely as the waves break on the shore, our lives must be directed to heaven, and yet we must also be involved in the rush and business of daily life. The former is almost certainly the more difficult during these weeks. But it can be done if we opt to deliberately turn off the TV, to unplug our ears from iPods or mobile phones and turn to a few moments of silent reflection about the hopes and promises of Advent. If we plug our listening into some quiet reading of Scripture (Lectio Divina), perhaps a re-read of some of the Sunday texts; if we seize a few moments of prayerful repentance or awareness of the presence of God in our travelling companions along our highways or on public transport or whilst shopping - these are ways in which we can respond to Psalm 85 and “hear what God proclaims.”

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