1st Sunday of Advent 2014
Fr. Bob VerEecke, S.J.
Have you downloaded the St. Ignatius app yet on your portable
device? If you had you would have received a push notification to
check out the Advent Tab. What you’ll see for Advent’s icon is a
clock. Actually, an old-fashioned alarm clock with bells that ring,
chime, sound to wake you up.
(Ring first bell)
I chose that icon of an alarm clock because Advent is about time
and it’s about alarms; the alarm that wakes you from sleep, the
alarm that sounds warning, the alarm in a voice that cries
“desperation.”
Advent is about time. You know this. It’s about the past, the
present and the future. How often have you heard about the three
comings of Christ: in history in the birth of Jesus; in the now, in
this gathering of faith-filled people; and in the “second coming”,
the return at the end of time.
The challenge of Advent is creating Time for God. Good time/
God time. Easier said than done in a life so programmed, so
overbooked, so crammed with “stuff”. With all the “stuff” we
have to do in the busiest season of the year, can we find time for
God, for prayer which is simply conversation with God? A
constant refrain of well-intentioned people is that there is not
enough time for prayer. Finding even 15 minutes is a daunting
task.
Advent is a time-frame and what we will do within that time-frame
can make all the difference. Can we reframe our time this Advent
so there is more time for an awareness of God’s presence in our
lives? There was a time when church bells chiming was the only
way of knowing what time it was. The tolling of church bells
called one into God’s time. Can we reframe our time so that we
live in God’s time?
(Ring second bell)
An Alarm! Wake up. Watch. Be alert. You do not know when the
master is coming. Don’t be lulled into complacency. Don’t take
life for granted. Don’t miss the moment. This first Sunday of
Advent gives us a jump start, a recharging of our spiritual battery.
Mark’s Gospel issues a warning: May the master not come
suddenly and find you sleeping. What I say to you, I say to all:
‘Watch!’”
And then there is the alarm in the voice of the prophet Isaiah!
Where are you O God? Why have your hidden your face from us?
Why don’t you rend the heavens so that we might know that you
are with us. We have wandered from you. We are like withered
leaves, decaying, lifeless, polluted rags, good for nothing.
Can you hear the alarm? The cry of desperation rings out. If only
God would hear. If only God were here!
But wait! The desperation in the voice of Isaiah from 2500 years
ago is echoed in the voices of refugees of war, in the voices of
victims of ISIS and the Boko Haram, victims of wars in the Middle
East, Ukraine, voices of desperation in US city streets…
The desperation in the voice of Isaiah is echoed in the voices of the
poor, the homeless, the powerless, the imprisoned, the sick and the
suffering. If only you would hear! If only you were here! Where
have you heard voices that cry out, “Where are you O God?”
(Ring third bell)
But wait – after the desperate cry of alarm is the confession.
You are the potter, we are the clay, the works of your hand. Mold
us. Shape us. We believe you are our Father, our redeemer, the
potter. You can never be far from us. You are in our time and in
our space.
(Ring first bell)
Advent is not just about time. It’s about space. In Advent we see
that God is filling the void, the empty space of our world. As we
cram so much into so little time. God crams so much into so little
space. Look at the empty crèche. Can this space contain the
divine? Can God fit into our world and not overwhelm the world?
Can God fit-in?
(2nd bell)
God’s choice was to fill a space within Mary’s womb and let that
space expand as she waited to give birth in time. In this Advent
season we no longer wait for the birth of Jesus in time but a
birthing in our time in the space we have created for God, in the
crèche of our flesh and blood.
So this Advent, not last Advent, or next advent, will we create time
and space for God? Will we let God break into and enter this time,
this space?
(3rd bell)