• Home
  • Mary Immaculate
    • Novena of the Immaculate Conception
  • Oblates
  • Blog
fatherdaniel
dd text

First Sunday of Advent - Homily

12/2/2017

1 Comment

 
Picture
            A couple of days ago I was walking a dog when a storm hit the town. Fortunately there was a covered area in front of a building where I decided to wait for the storm to pass. However the storm didn’t want to pass. On the contrary it was hanging around.
            My Dear Sisters and Brothers! You could say that that day I had an early taste of Advent, as we understand Advent as the season of waiting, don’t we? I do agree that standing under the tin roof and listening to the rain hitting it and thunderstorms I had an early start to Advent. However it wasn’t because waiting was testing my patience. It was because I was rescued. A man was driving his Ute when he spotted me and the dog. He did a U-turn and offered to take me and the dog home. What did it have to do with Advent? Well, Advent means both literally and theologically: ‘Coming.’ I don’t mean coming of a storm but coming of Jesus Christ. Our Blessed Lord said in the Gospel: ‘Stay awake, because you do not know when the master of the house is coming.’ He didn’t say if but when, though he explained to us that we will ‘never know when the time will come.’ However the essence of the season of Advent, which we are beginning this Sunday, is about treasuring and encouraging each other with the words: ‘Our Lord is coming.’ St John in the Gospel recorded the words of Jesus from the Last Supper: ‘I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you. Before long, the world will not see me anymore, but you will see me.’
            The second reading for this Mass, taken from the first letter of St Paul to the Corinthians, was rather brief, only six verses. However if you read it carefully you realise that Paul in those six verses managed to speak about Jesus six times. Even the people who are not religious at all could tell that Jesus Christ was very important to Paul. As we begin a new Church year, which is centred on the event of Jesus Christ, we remember that Our Lord is continually coming. ‘Our Redeemer’ as the prophet Isaiah called him ‘has torn the heavens open’ to the extent that the heavens are not a border between us and God. Our coming Lord offers to take us out of our problems in the way we don’t expect. We don’t need to wait for the problem to pass. We don’t need to struggle with our sins on our own or to wait until they somehow rather disappear. Jesus is coming.
            My Dear Friends! Many people, including people we know, are stuck in the middle of their problems and overwhelming situations. They don’t know that by believing in Jesus they can, with Jesus, pass over those problems and situations, that they can experience a new life and a new freedom.
            Twenty two years ago, on December 3, John Paul II canonised Eugene de Mazenod who founded the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate. Twenty two years ago it was also Sunday. In his homily the Pope said: ‘We are living in the second Advent of the world’s history. Eugene de Mazenod was a man of Advent, a man of the Coming. He not only looked forward to that Coming, he dedicated his whole life to preparing for it, one of those apostles who prepared the modern age, our age… What Saint Eugene waned to achieve was that, in Jesus Christ, each individual could become a fully complete person, an authentic Christian, a credible saint.’
Eugene desired to show everyone that by trusting and believing Jesus people are like the clay in the hand of the potter, God. God who never tires of working on us, like he worked on the first people as we read in the Genesis.
            I am grateful to the man who picked me up from my hiding place and dropped me off to the presbytery last week, when severe storms were rolling through the town. However I am forever grateful to our Blessed Lord who after picking me up when I am lost and overwhelmed doesn’t just drop me off but stays with me and works on me.

1 Comment
Kath Fullagar
12/3/2017 11:15:11 am

Thank you always Father Daniel.....God Bless you...

Reply



Leave a Reply.

    Archives

    February 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    June 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013
    November 2013
    October 2013
    September 2013
    August 2013
    July 2013
    June 2013
    May 2013
    April 2013

    Fr Daniel OMI

    An Oblate Priest

    Categories

    All
    Holy Land
    Homilies
    St Eugene De Mazenod

    RSS Feed

Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.