Pastoral reflection for Advent

"Blessed the one whose hope is in the LORD, his God," (Psalm 146:5).

We spend a large part of our lives slumbering, without real awareness of what is going on around us and even within us. We live distracted, unable to make sense of what is happening to us, sometimes out of laziness, sometimes out of fear of opening our eyes and facing possible disappointments. This state is aggravated in a context where complaints, anxieties and impatience seem to drown out any good news, and where every day information increases our insecurity and weakens the hope for a more fraternal humanity. It is true that needs, both our own and those of others, press upon us. Without time, we become impatient with what is delaying.

However, at the end of the year, the liturgy of the Church calls us back to hope. We begin the season of Advent, a time of four weeks to pause and wait for Christmas, that is, for God. To begin a new liturgical year of waiting invites us to recognise ourselves as pilgrims who have received as a gift a hope generated by faith. In this context, Advent is a propitious, favourable, liberating time. It invites us to pause, to pray, to open ourselves to hope, to listen, even in the midst of confusion, to the voice of Jesus who tells us: Look up: your salvation is at hand.

A time to prepare the heart

Advent is a unique opportunity to wait for the God who is born in a new way in your life. It is also the time to prepare the heart and free it from all that speaks of idols and thus to welcome the Birth of Jesus. Yes, because Advent only makes sense if it allows us to reach the Manger, like the Shepherds, and to enter it, like the Magi, always to adore God. This implies an active readiness, moreover, an invitation to be joyful and awake before the One whom we await. Let God's love enter fully, renewing us and preparing us to receive Emmanuel, God with us. If your heart is sad, "Awake, O sleeper, and arise from the dead, and Christ will give you light" (Eph. 5:14). Be joyful and full of hope, because Christ is coming, and awake because the Lord is near, exhorts us to abandon a tired and half-hearted Christianity. Advent is the right time to awaken joy in our hearts and to renew our waiting in "the One who is, who was, and who is to come" (Rev. 1:8).

Pilgrims of hope

This time also introduces us to the Jubilee year. Each of you, as pilgrims of hope, sowers and witnesses of God's promise, can also listen to John the Baptist proclaiming in the desert: " all flesh shall see the salvation of God " (Lk. 3, 6, Advent II). I invite you, dear sisters, to take care of this Advent. During this time may we, both personally and as a community, find grounds to give reason for our hope (1 Pt 3:15). May the joy and light of Christ renew your life and fill you with hope. As the Psalm says: "I wait for the Lord, my soul waitsand I hope for his word; my soul looks for the Lord more than sentinels for daybreak" (Psalm 130:5-6). May the Lord grant us the grace to open our hearts, detaching ourselves from what enslaves us, to walk with joy and faith towards Christmas. Wait, for the Lord is coming.

December 2024

P. Marcelo Gidi S.J.

Ecclesiastical Assistant