First Sunday of Advent

Indeed, the Lord is coming. I must get ready! What shall I do? Think of a mother-to -be, preparing for the birth of her child. Everything centres on the new life coming, everything is done with the child in mind. And where does she start? She checks out her lifestyle, looking for habits, which might harm a new life.

And so for us advent is the time to "clothe ourselves in the garment of light we were given at baptism." It is the time of the righting of wrongs, of forgiveness and reconciliation, of restoring the possibility of life truly lived in freedom and hope for all peoples.

The first Sunday of the season looks at the universal issues - time and eternity, war and peace, salvation and death. Matthew's call is to look, to see. Advent is the start of a great adventure, a time when we are to remember God's word, stand up straight and look God in the eye and take our place on God's side. Our God is on the side of the poor, the immigrant, and the homeless. The Holy One is coming to bind us to one another in peace.

And so we pray an eighteenth century collect:

"Grant us grace to rest from all sinful deeds and thoughts,
to surrender ourselves wholly unto Thee, and keep our souls
still before Thee, like a still lake, so that the beams of Thy
grace may be mirrored therein, and may kindle in our hearts
the glow of faith and love and prayer."

-Eighteenth century collect, from Advent, Christmas
and Epiphany by Megan McKenna

By Mary Buckley CSJ
Photo by Mary Doreen Smith CSJ