Advent, a season of joyful expectation before Christmas, begins Nov. 29 this year. The Advent wreath, with a candle marking each week of the season, is a traditional symbol of the liturgical period. (CNS photo/Lisa A. Johnston, St. Louis Review)
THIRD SUNDAY OF ADVENT
Isaiah 61:1-2a, 10-11; 1 Thessalonians 5:16-24; John 1:6-8, 19-28
This weekend the church celebrates “Gaudete Sunday,” the name coming from the opening word of the Entrance Antiphon. In Latin, “gaudete” means “to rejoice.” Rejoicing is not appropriate because Advent, and its stress on prayer and penance, is half completed, but rather because Christmas is nearer.
Another reason for rejoicing is that, hopefully, all feel closer to God as a result of observing Advent with prayer, reflection and penance. If we have used Advent as intended by the church, we are nearer to a fuller communion with the Lord, the “light of the world.”
The third part of Isaiah furnishes the first reading. When this passage was written, God’s People were weary and frustrated.
They, or their forebears, had undergone the humiliation, uncertainty, and misery of exile in Babylon. When allowed finally to leave Babylon and return to their homeland, they understandably were overjoyed.
A sterile and parched land, hardly flowing with milk and honey, awaited them. Had God tricked them, providing for their release from Babylon only to subject them to worse trials at home? Did God even exist?
Typically for Third Isaiah, this reading glows with optimism. Whatever may be the reality of the moment, for those loyal to God, a wondrous future awaits.
St. Paul’s First Epistle to the Thessalonians provides the second reading. Belief in the Lord’s Second Coming, and impatience to see it occur, filled the first generations of Christianity. This reading well catches this mood.
Longing for the Second Coming among the early Christians is not hard to explain. They had much to endure. Cruel, severe persecution had developed. The culture all around the Christians was hostile. Temptations to renounce the Gospel abounded.
Paul reassured the Christians of Thessalonica, urging them to be true to the Gospel. God, and God’s goodness, would one day prevail.
St. John’s Gospel is the source of the last reading. The reading is a story about John the Baptist, whose own identity puzzled many of his contemporaries. Some assumed that John was the Messiah. Others wondered if he were Elijah, or another prophet who had returned to earth.
Replying to these questions, John was very firm. Another would follow him, he insisted. John was to prepare the way for this future representative of God. John is not worthy even to untie the straps of his sandals.
Reflection
Priests may wear rose-colored vestments on this weekend, symbolizing the dark violet of Advent already being lightened by the forthcoming light of the Lord’s arrival in our souls.
Why rose? As day breaks, the sky does not suddenly change from black to brilliant gold. Light creeps over the horizon, its first rays rose, a blending of dark purple with gold.
In calling us to rejoice this Gaudete weekend, the church either presumes that we have spent the weeks of Advent pondering within ourselves the meaning of salvation for us personally and individually, or it urges us to use the remaining time in this season to seek God with all our hearts.
Excitedly, the liturgy proclaims that when the Lord’s kingdom comes, how wonderful it will be! “Gaudete!” Rejoice!
When the Lord’s kingdom comes, death and evil indeed will end.
Still, we voluntarily must turn to God, admitting God into our hearts. Necessarily, we wholeheartedly must reject our own sin.
Many influences will weaken our determination to reject sin. Holy resolve will require conviction, discipline and focus.
Always the good teacher, the church, through this reading from John’s Gospel, instructs us to look for Jesus, realistically, never creating our own false versions of the messiah.
Repentance and re-dedication are hard, but the gold of the new day of Christ will reward our efforts. The remaining time of Advent gives us time to go to the light.
