4th Sunday of Advent 22 December 2024 Sermon

4th Sunday of Advent 22 December 2024 Salvation mediated

God could have come as an adult and saved Himself a lot of trouble. But He wanted to experience being human, not taking convenient short cuts. He shows his desire to enter our world and live our life, only in His case to do that in a perfect human nature.

He took a longer route (infancy, childhood) to teach us that we should participate in our own salvation. He could have just sent a message from Heaven, telling us we are all pardoned, all forgiven.

Sometimes people get a quick clearance – e.g. the Good Thief - but for most people the process of being saved has not been quick.

Participating in our own salvation means we are aware of what is happening and cooperating with whatever God asks of us. We learn on the job, we could say.

As the Church, and as individual disciples, we learn to recognise God's ways. If we cannot understand them fully, we can at least grasp the general idea and learn to recognize and accept God's holy will.

God wants to save us in such a way that we be people who live to the full potential of our human nature, now redeemed and sanctified in Christ.

Salvation is not just ‘going to Heaven’ as though we move from one place to another.

It is to be set free from sin -  the guilt of sin, the hold it has on us, and the damage it does.

At the same time, our relationship with God is restored and enriched.

When we realize what God is trying to do, we realize why He took the longer way to save us. He was preparing us and getting us to ‘prepare the way for Him.’ A lot of careful thought has to go into the process of salvation. It is not a simple matter; there are many things which need attention.

Those who lose patience with God are not going to see the subtle points. They want miracles and right now. They do not see their own disorder nor think they need any particular help. 

God is not a fast-food delivery service. He is more like a gardener, digging here and probing there, and giving all the right nutrients. He changes us within, pulling out all the bad bits and giving instead the fruits of the Holy Spirit (Ga 5,22-23).

Mary had this perfect understanding of what God was doing. She did not understand everything but was so attuned to His will that she cooperated fully.

We re-live the Annunciation as being closely connected with Christmas. Without Mary’s consent we would have no Saviour.

We re-live the Visitation whereby she foreshadows the evangelisation of the whole world, bearing the Saviour to us. Notice the mediating role. This is what God wants from us all, that we give and receive from each other the essential Gospel.

God works through anyone who will let Him. The more we love the more He entrusts to us, and then become able to give more still. Even in Heaven we can increase our love for God, as our capacity for love increases.

Most times it is not something great required, just getting the little things right.

Imitating Mary we are open to whatever God might ask, and we do it without complaint.

We give Him our best, the best lamb from the flock. 

And we encourage each other to go further, not stopping too soon, as many people do.

Come, O come Emmanuel, dwell in us in a way that requires and rewards our participation.

3rd Sunday of Advent 15 December 2024 Sermon

 3rd Sunday of Advent 15 December 2024  Recapturing joy

At times we  have some joyful experiences in life, such as wedding days, passing exams,  winning a grand final - and we wish those feelings of joy could stay always, but unfortunately the joy fades away.

Imagine you were present at Bethlehem at the first Christmas, or at the empty tomb the first Easter, and how good that must have felt. Yet even these joys faded somewhat with time, and the people involved had to deal with other problems – such as divisions in the Church.

Yesterday’s miracle can seem like old news if we let it. 

If the joy of something fades it does not necessarily mean the experience has disappeared; it may just have sunk down deeper;  still there, but not as easy to identify. It does not mean we have lost our faith, just that the emotional support is not always there.

God wants us to learn how to trust Him; to walk by faith not by sight  (2 Co 5,7).

The whole history of the Church is there for us to draw upon and find the strength we need now. Christ has died, Christ has risen, Christ will come again. We have the Bible,  creeds, councils, popes, saints - they all sustain us if we turn to them.  

We are glad these events happened, but how to connect with them so that they have their full effect? 

We do not let the passing of time dim our enthusiasm. The reason we gather on a Sunday is to recapture the Sunday that Jesus rose from the dead, and the Sunday that the Holy Spirit descended on the apostles.

The people were excited then; they can be excited now. Sometimes we will feel it; all the time we will believe it.

And the more we believe, the more we are going to see signs of victorious activity around us. Blessed are those who have not seen and yet believe (Jn 20,29).

Our repetition of prayers and sacraments should work to cement our faith more fully.

We believed it in the past, so we believe it now, and always.

The passing of time is one thing. What about when things happen which are decidedly non -joyful.  Rejoice always does not mean we are happy about bad things that happen. What we are glad about is that Christ is Risen, and all the connected themes that go with that.

If even one thing that we believe is true we have enough joy for the whole world and for all time. If one part of the chain is true, then so is the whole chain. 

There are many things going on but front and centre there is Jesus Christ, and I belong to Him; my life is based on Him, and He lives in me. This is what I am happy about. 

The sorrow is real, but we do not dwell in it, or on it, but reclaim the joy that never expires;  and sometimes at least the feelings will come along too; but with or without them we have the basic truth which sets us free (Jn 8,31-32).

Every day we can reaffirm who we are, what we are, where we have come from, where we are going. We check in with God to get all those things back in the right place and when balanced correctly we must be happy.

All praise to Jesus Christ, born, died, risen and coming again.  

2nd Sunday of Advent (C) 8 September 2024 Sermon

2nd Sunday of Advent (C)        8 December 2024 Salvation

Prepare ye the way of the lord… a levelling out of what is crooked can be taken in different ways.

There is what God does for us, and what we need to do in response to Him - which is to repent; and then keep that repentance in view as we purify our lives of all that is unworthy of disciples of Christ. We do not grasp for too much but travel light on our pilgrim way.

God rescues us by leading us to true sorrow for sin and a continuous learning of what He wants to reveal to us.

God wants to take us a long way, probably a lot further than we would have sought for ourselves.

Consider, you are on a raft at sea, in great danger. A boat comes by and rescues you. There is gratitude about being saved from such a predicament. This is ‘salvation’ to a point, but if I was a greedy grasping person while I was on the raft, I will still be greedy and grasping when I am safely on the boat. I still need more saving, to get my character right.

Salvation, divine style, is when we go that extra step and seek inner healing, the forgiveness and healing of all that is wrong in our thoughts and attitudes. This is what comes out of my mouth and what actions I do. It is from within (Mk 7,21-23) Our Lord says, that good or evil things come, not from external rituals.

If we get the interior right the external behaviour will match accordingly. Blessed are the peacemakers etc 

People generally stop too short of the kind of self-renewal that is needed. 

Some will say that we must take people as they are. Yes, but that does not rule out correcting faults. Self-acceptance means I am called to belong to Gods family; healing of faults will restore me to Gods family and give me a strong sense of belonging.

We participate in our own salvation. To be saved I have to face my own contribution to the problem. I cannot just put all the blame onto others, or the ‘system’.

It will take more than  education or discussion; I need to be right with God.

Some will declare victory too soon. ‘I have met the Lord; I am saved’ It is  a good start but there is a long way to go.

On the other hand, we can become cynical about life and people, doubting they can ever change for the better. But we have some strong anti-cynicism medicine in our prayer and sacraments!

The levelling of the countryside means the removal of obstacles. We can take a fresh approach to reaching God's kingdom.

He will clear away obstacles in our path, and we will do the same for Him.

He will enable us to see things in a new light and that will give us motivation to do things differently.

We will make it easier for him to save us if we do not resist. The one sheep could run away from the good shepherd. People generally resist God's efforts to save them. Unless they hit rock bottom like the prodigal son.

We will not get a completely straight run in this life, but we can make it easier than it has been so far.

Prepare the way of the Lord!

1st Sunday of Advent 1 December 2024 Sermon

1st Sunday of advent 1 December 2024 Stages of growth

The season of Advent tends to be somewhat swamped by Christmas, as most Christmas events are celebrated before Christmas Day arrives.

We still have the Advent liturgy, however, and that keeps us in our place as far as needing to prepare for Christmas, and not just stumble into it.

The Advent readings take us the full range of time, from distant future to distant past, as we contemplate the infinite power and goodness of God.

All time is in God’s hands, He is the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last. We squeeze in there somewhere; small as we are we will not be overlooked.

The Advent season, coming over four weeks gives us a sense of progression from one stage to the next. Think of the Advent wreath as an accumulation of desire on our part, desiring the Lord more each week than the week before. And this of course can go all year, as we grow in our love of God from one time to the next.

As it has been observed, how can we be afraid to meet the Lord if we profess to love Him?

We do not usually fear those we love. So, it is put to us in today’s Gospel that we should go out to meet the Lord with our heads held high. To be able to do that we need to ask Him to draw us along, teaching us, forgiving us, generally maintaining us. He will be no stranger to us when we meet Him on the Last Day.

We are commanded to love God. That it needs to be a command is to help us get used to the idea. But when we love Him enough, we will not need to be told to love Him. The love will flow naturally. It will come with prayer and sacraments as we realize Gods progressive goodness to us.

God knows we cannot take in much at a time, so He reveals His plans gradually, stretching over thousands of years and many generations. 

So, are we progressing in the love of God? We love what is loveable; once we break through initial reserve we will see much more.

We must do some basic things to help this along, such as attend Mass. Get the little things right and the big ones will follow.

We will shed earthly attachments as we do this. Thus, we de-clutter the way; we live simple and good lives, with all the various virtues emerging as needed. Make straight the way of the Lord. 

Many see the Church and religion in general as a kind of drag. Not if we get into the right understanding. A lot of it may be unfamiliar but we get to like it. 

Ask a child who plays in the back yard. Ask him if he would like to be still doing that in ten years’ time. He would probably say yes, but ask him in ten years and he would not want to go back. 

And that in a nutshell is our situation. We don’t know the layout of where we are going, but we do know it is better than here; and we will be better people there than we are here.

The four weeks of Advent symbolise a continuous movement towards eternity. 

May we never stop loving God or seeking more.

In the meantime, let this be the best Advent and best Christmas ever!