Advent Reflections on the Coming of Christ

 

In both the Nativity and the Crucifixion of Jesus, we are shown that “this is God and God is like this. God is not greater than he is in this humiliation. God is not more glorious than he is in this self-surrender. God is not more powerful than he is in this helplessness. God is not more divine than he is in this humanity. Everything that can be said of God is to be found in this Christ event.”    — Jurgen Moltmann

 

 

Consequently, dearly beloved, the whole learning of Christian wisdom consists not in abundance of words, not in cleverness at disputing, not in desire for praise and glory, but in a true and willing humility. This is what the Lord Jesus Christ chose and taught from within the womb of his Mother right up to his torment on the cross.     – St. Leo the Great

 

 

It is the incomprehensible fact of God entering into history; that he stepped into our law, into our space, into our existence—not only like one of us, but as one of us. This is the thrill and incomprehensibility of this event. History now becomes the Son’s mode of existence….He is to be encountered on our streets. In the darkest cellars and the loneliest prisons of life, we will meet him. He is to be met under the weight of our burden …a new, powerful shoulder…joins in the carrying…Ever since that Holy Night, the divine-human life became the model of existence, according to which all life will be formed by God, if we do not resist this formation….We will be better able to cope with life, more efficient and capable of life, if we open ourselves to the instructions of this coming night. Let us hike and journey onward, neither avoiding nor shunning the streets and ter-ror of life. Something new has been born in us, and we do not want to tire of believing the star of the promises and acknowledging the singing angels’ Gloria—even if it is some-times through tears.  Our distress has truly become transformed, because we have been raised above it.    – Fr. Alfred Delp, SJ

 

 

“To keep the Word of God,” as Jesus enjoins, cannot at bottom mean anything other than allowing the Holy Spirit to implant the Son of the Father in the womb of our souls, and then for us to give birth to this Word into the world in union with Mary, the historical Mother of Jesus and the perennial Mother of the Church. The kerygmatic birth of Jesus into the world from the womb of the apostles’ faith cannot be a substantially different birth from the historical one that took place in Bethlehem, for there is only one Christ Jesus….To be a Christian and a disciple, then, means becoming Christ-bearers in the world in the most radical and literal sense. However, such a visible presence and communication of the total Jesus through us cannot occur without our being in constant communion with both the Father and the Mother of Jesus, the two origins of his divine and human life. The Holy Spirit…cannot effect the conception of the Son of the Most High within us—and we cannot become another Mary, the Christian vocation in a nutshell—unless we seek the company of her through whom and in whom he is permanently present.   

                                                                                                        – Erasmo Leiva-Merikakis

 

Without the power of the Word, the Virgin could not have conceived or given birth; without the reality of flesh, the Infant could not have lain wrapped in his swaddling clothes. Without the power of the Word, the wise men could not have worshiped the Child announced by that new star; without the reality of flesh, the Boy could not have been taken to Egypt in accordance with an order from Herod….Without the power of the Word, there could not have been any restoration of the sick and raising of the dead; without the reality of flesh, food would not have been necessary for him after fasting nor sleep for him when he was tired. Without the power of the Word, the Lord would not have proclaimed himself equal to the Father; without the reality of flesh, he would not have said that the Father is greater than himself. Catholic faith takes up both and defends both, for it believes that—the distinctive natures of the divine and of the human substances notwithstanding—one and the same Son of God is both man and the Word.    – St. Leo the Great

 

From this great “both/and” of human and divine in the Incarnation comes the Catholic “sacramental imagination.”  Catholics live in an enchanted world, a world of statues and holy water, stained glass and votive candles, saints and religious medals, rosary beads and holy pictures. But these Catholic paraphernalia are mere hints of a deeper and more pervasive religious sensibility which inclines Catholics to see the holy lurking in creation. As Catholics, we find our houses and our world haunted by a sense that the objects, events, events and persons of daily life are revelations of grace.    – Fr. David Tracy

 

 

Through the Word made flesh all creation is being divinized. Through your own In-carnation, my God, all matter is henceforth incarnate.  – Fr. Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, SJ

 

How Do You Spell “Christmas”?

 

Advent is a time of preparation to accept the Christ into our hearts and lives. This means an intense focus upon what is really our lifelong spiritual task—the crucifixion of our False Self and the resurrection of our True Self. How we approach the great feast of the Nativity brings this task into sharper focus. Deacon Gilbert Weissler asks, “What Christ will we prepare ourselves to accept? Which Christ we are prepared for will be based on how we spell “Christmas”:

 

“C"    “Coming of Christ” or “Coming of Santa Claus”

“H”    “Hearing the cry of the poor” or “Hearing the siren’s song of pleasure”

“R”    “Reaching out to those in need” or “Running away from those in need”

“I”     “Inviting others to share in your gifts” or “Indifference to others”

“S”    “Seeking God”  or  “Seeking self-gratification”

“T”    “Turning outwards to others”  or  “Turning inwards to self”

“M”    “Making our life God-centered” or “Making our life things-centered”

“A”    “Aspiring to spiritual riches” or “Aspiring to worldly riches”

“S”    “Seeking to complete others” or “Seeking to compete with others”

 

The letters in “Christmas” are the same in both spellings….The first can give you a lifetime of joy; the second a momentary pleasure for a day.

 

What do we seek when we sit down to silent prayer with Mary and Sacred Scripture? “Not mental information or moral instruction or a sentimental influence….What we seek with all our soul is the possibility of opening ourselves up in prayer to God’s transform-ing action….We desire a change of life, a conversion from what we presently are to a more precise embodiment of the likeness of Christ at the center of our being, radiating out from us through all our thoughts, words, and actions. This is why the life of contemplation is the boldest and most adventuresome of undertakings, for what could be more radical, more earth-shattering, than the willingness to be dismantled and created anew, not once or twice in a lifetime, but day after day? “If any one is in Christ, he is a new creation.” But this is not a passive work. Our “clay” is…our will and freedom and thoughts and feelings and desires, and all of these have to be surrendered every day anew to God’s power. We cannot become new creations without actively participating in our remaking by the Holy Spirit.     – Erasmo Leiva-Merikakis

                                

"Apparition" by Richard Arredondo

 

In Praise of the Guadalupe, Mary Immaculate

 

Let us copy her faith, who received God’s message by the angel without a doubt; her patience, who endured St. Joseph’s surprise without a word; her obedience, who went up to Bethlehem in the winter and bore our Lord in a stable; her meditative spirit, who pondered in her heart what she saw and heard; her fortitude, whose heart the sword went through; her self-surrender, who gave him up and consented to his death. What shall bring you forward in the narrow way, if you live in the world, but the thought and patronage of Mary? What shall seal your senses, tranquilize your heart…give you patience and endurance, when you are wearied with the conflict with evil…but a loving communion with Mary! She will comfort you in your discouragements, solace you in your fatigues, raise you after your falls….When your spirit within you loses its balance, when it is restless and wayward, what will bring you to yourselves, to peace and to health, but …the Immaculate.     

                                                                                                                 – Blessed John Henry Newman