Poem: "The Burning Babe" by Robert Southwell, S.J.

As I in hoary winter's night stood shivering in the snow,
surprised I was with sudden heat which made my heart to glow;
and lifting up a fearful eye to view what fire was near,
a pretty babe all burning bright did in the air appear;

Who, scorched with excessive heat, such floods of tears did shed,
as though his floods should quench his flames, which with his tears were bred:
'Alas!' quoth he, 'but newly born in fiery heats I fry,
yet none approach to warm their hearts or feel my fire but I!

'My faultless breast the furnace is; the fuel, wounding thorns;
love is the fire, and signs the smoke; the ashes, shames and scorns;
The fuel justice layeth on, and mercy blows the coals,
The metal in this furnace wrought are men's defiled souls;

For which, as now on fire I am to work them to their good,
so will I melt into a bath, to wash them in my blood.'
With this he vanished out of sight and swiftly shrunk away,
and straight I called unto my mind that it was Christmas Day.

Prayer: Isaiah 11:1-10 - The Vision of Kingdom at Peace

From Isaiah 11:1-10

On that day, a shoot shall sprout from the stump of Jesse,
and from his roots a bud shall blossom.
The spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him:
a spirit of wisdom and of understanding,
a spirit of counsel and of strength,
a spirit of knowledge and of fear of the Lord,
and his delight shall be the fear of the Lord.

Not by appearance shall he judge, nor by hearsay shall he decide,
but he shall judge the poor with justice,
and decide aright for the land's afflicted.
He shall strike the ruthless with the rod of his mouth,
and with the breath of his lips he shall slay the wicked.
Justice shall be the band around his waist,
and faithfulness a belt upon his hips.

Then the wolf shall be a guest of the lamb,
and the leopard shall lie down with the kid;
the calf and the young lion shall browse together,
with a little child to guide them.

The cow and the bear shall be neighbors,
together their young shall rest;
the lion shall eat hay like the ox,
the baby shall play by the cobra's den,
and the child lay his hand on the adder's lair.

There shall be no harm or ruin on all my holy mountain;
for the earth shall be filled with knowledge of the Lord,
as the water covers the sea.

On that day, the root of Jesse, set up as a signal for the nations,
the Gentiles shall seek out, for his dwelling shall be glorious.

Homily for Closing Advent Liturgy - Luke 7 (Are you the One who is to Come?)

It is our sincere hope that during this past week the Lord God has touched a deep part of you. Perhaps God healed a long-festering memory, allowed you to hear or see through God's ears and eyes by entering into the silent stillness, brought you new life or is nurturing some new life within you. This has been our wish and prayer for you all week.

We arrived during the busy days of our commercial Christmas season that we call Advent. We left the frenetic pace of our lives because we were filled with the wonder expressed by John the Baptist and his disciples. They asked, "Are you the one who is to come or should we look for another?" If this sounds familiar, it is because we heard it in Matthew's Gospel on Sunday. So we've had a chance to ponder it. Though we are familiar with God, perhaps the one steadfast, creating God we met in Isaiah's reading, we are still left with many questions about God's concern for us and God's ability to continue to create the world.

During these past 8 days, we have celebrated the events that foretell the coming of Jesus, his Mom's Immaculate Conception, Juan Diego and the truth of honestly presenting ourselves before God, the Rejoicing that we feel on Gaudete Sunday as we hit Advent's homestretch, the light Lucy brings to us and the darkness we experience like John of the Cross. We have had our share of conversations with the Lord and our share of times in which prayer seemed ineffective. We were mired in the dark chaos of our lives and we experienced the light that overcomes all darkness. And now it is time to leave. It is time to approach the quickening pace of the "O Antiphon" days that start on Friday. We sense something deep within creation is happening. Almost invisible forces are at work and we can only sit back in startled amazement.

"What did you come out here to see," asked Jesus? And we replied, "are you the one who is to come or should we look for another?" After eight days, these questions are worth pondering. Luke's Gospel tells us that Jesus cured many of his diseases, sufferings, and evil spirits. He also granted sight to many who were blind. Something may have happened to you on these days with Jesus, but is your question answered? Is this the Messiah who is to come? Is he a Messiah for me? It is like the question, Does God love me? We answer 'yes' because God loves everyone and I am part of everyone. But does God like me? This is a different question. Does God like me enough to spend time with me, relax with me, want to know me more intimately? Will this Messiah care enough personally for me to save me?

We re-enter the frenzied world we left. Our friends, communities, and loved ones will ask, "what happened?" What are you going to tell them? They want to know. This question is a larger one than you may realize. It is bigger than you. They want to know if you have changed. They want to know if you still like them and want to be with them. They want to know if they still matter to you - even the person who is your biggest pain in the butt. They want to know whether they ought to seek out the one you yearn for and whether this one is the Promised One. Be gentle with them. Smile at them and tell them you missed them!

Some of our brothers and sisters couldn't wait. They've already left when they heard Jesus instruct them to go and tell John (and others) what you have seen and heard. And soon you will go out. In some ways it is very difficult to speak of what we have come to know. Eventually the words will come. You retreat is a process that is merely at its beginning. Like a child in the womb, it must be nurtured and grow before it enters the world. We simply communicate in our attitudes and demeanor what we cannot say in words. Our Messiah is coming. How are we going to wait for him? How are we going to look for him?

For some, we cannot bear the confronting way of a powerful Messiah at Christmas. Our senses cannot fully take him in without a dramatic response from us. We may push him away because we are not yet ready to let go. We can more easily accept the pregnancy of a young couple about to give birth. We can fall in love with this little one. We can marvel and wonder at him and we can care for him by giving him our affection. He grows with our loving responses. It is our time to be gentle with him. Later on, we will need him to be gentle with us.

"Are you the one who is to come?" In the next week and a half we have time to reflect more deeply on this question. Look for the signs. Be awed with the odd. If we pay attention, we have and can experience the blind regaining their sight, the deaf getting their ears opened, the lame standing tall and walking, the dead coming back to life, and many hearing the good news preached to them. God's breaking into our world will bring more light, but light also reveals the extent of the darkness. We cannot get out of this darkness on our own. We come to realize we need God to save us.

As you leave retreat, slow down. Admire the silence, but enter more deeply into the stillness where you can admire the tiny child who is to be born for us. We have to ask him again, "Are you the one who is to come?" Wait for his answer. Be patient. Be gentle. Provide him with the nourishment and care he needs to get through the night. Together, his life and ours are entwined. Learn to grow more intimate with him. May he find the wonder in our beauty as we find the beauty in his wonder.

Go, now. Tell John and others what you know. A child is to be born to us, a son will be given - a child who will reveal a God who is beyond all names. God promises to be with us because God yearns longingly for us. Who is this One who is to come? Come. Let us go meet him.

Prayer: The Cloud’s Veil

As the rain hides the stars and the clouds veil the blue skies,
so the dark happenings of my life hide the shining of your face.
Yet, if I may hold your hand
in the darkness, it is enough.
Since I know that,
though I may stumble in my going,
you do not fall. Amen.

Prayer: The darkness and the light are both alike for you

For the darkness of waiting
of not knowing what is to come
of staying ready and quiet and attentive.

For the darkness of staying silent
for the terror of having nothing to say
and for the greater terror of needing to say nothing.

For the darkness of loving
in which it is safe to surrender
to let go of our self protection
and to stop holding back our desire.

For the darkness of choosing
when you give us the moment to speak, to act, and change,
and we cannot know what we have set in motion
but we still have to take the risk.

For the darkness of hoping
in a world which longs for you
for the wrestling and laboring of all creation
for wholeness and justice and freedom.

We praise you, O God.

Song: Lost in the Night (Finnish Song, 1929, Tr. Olav Lee)

Lost in the night doth the heathen yet languish,
Longing for morning the darkness to vanquish,
Plaintively heaving a sigh full of anguish:
Will not day come soon? Will not day come soon?

Must he be vainly awaiting the morrow?
Shall we who have it no light let him borrow?
Giving no heed to his burden of sorrow:
Will you help us soon? Will you help us soon?

Sorrowing brother, in darkness yet dwelling,
Dawned hath the day of a radiance excelling,
Death's dreaded darkness forever dispelling:
Christ is coming soon! Christ is coming soon!

Light o'er the land of the heathen is beaming,
Rivers of life through its deserts are streaming,
Millions yet sigh for the Savior redeeming:
Come and save us soon! Come and save us soon!

Poem: A solis ortus cardine

From the edge of the sunrise, to the ends of the earth,
we sing to Christ our leader, born of the Virgin Mary.
The blest Author of ages took on the form of a slave,
that flesh might be liberated by flesh,
and not consigned to perdition.

The grace of heaven entered the womb of the chaste parent:
the belly of a girl carried secretly that which in uncreated.
He endured a bed of straw, and did not despise the manger;
he was nursed like an ordinary infant.

The celestial choir rejoiced, and sang to God:
the Shepherd of Creation was made know to shepherds.
Jesus, glory be to you, born of the Virgin,
and to the Father and to the Holy Spirit, for eternity of ages. Amen.

Poem: "A Child My Choice" by Robert Southwell, S.J.

Let folly praise that fancy loves, I praise and love that child.Whose heart no thought, no tongue no word,
whose hand no deed defiled.
I praise him most, I love him best, all praise and love is his;
While him I love, in him I live, and cannot live amiss


Love's sweetest mark, laud's highest theme,
man's most desired light,
To love him life, to leave him death, to live in him delight.
He mine by gift, I his by debt, thus each to other due.
First friend he was, best friend he is, all times will try him true.

Third Sunday in Advent

December 12, 2010

The closer we get to Christmas, the more we feel like John the Baptist who is imprisoned at the end of his life. He examines his life and wonders whether he placed his hope in the right person. All that he worked towards will be vindicated by this answer. He will either die with integrity or in despair. He sits in his prison cell and wonders. He sends out his disciples to Jesus to ask if he is the Messiah.

For sure Jesus was sad for John because of his fate, but I wonder if Jesus is passing his delight onto John through his disciples when he answers cryptically: the blind see, the lame walk, lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor know the good news is preached to them. Jesus realizes John will be filled with a joyous gladness because these in-breaking events tell him that Scripture is being fulfilled. John can rest in peace that he has seen the beginning of the salvation of the world. John's lifework has been completed and he prepared the next generation for the miraculous events that are to come. Though apart, Jesus and John are able to delight in God's saving actions.

Surely, John's disciples heard Jesus praise him to the others. It is always nice to hear someone receive affirmation, especially a close friend. John is upheld as a great prophet and a necessary forerunner to Jesus. Scripture testified to John's role in salvation history and he is honored for his greatness. Though John's death saddens the day's tone, it cannot erase the elation and completion he must feel for abiding God's will.

Isaiah's reading finds the Jewish people in a desolate space while in exile but they are encouraged to see the signs that will lead to their joy and gladness. In this they can rejoice. The letter of James asks us to be patient with our deep yearnings because this patience calls us to be active and to make our hearts ready to receive God's kingdom. It places us again in John the Baptist's state who can sense his liberation while in bondage.

Paradoxically, as we near Christmas we become more aware of the ways we need liberation from imprisoning bonds. We realize our abject brokenness and we can do nothing to repair it. Relationships are messy and most times we cannot effect the reconciliation we crave. Like the Jews in exile, we feel doomed.

Ironically, God has to come in through the back door for us. We can accept the image of an infant who will become the Messiah more easily than we can accept the grown up Messiah. The image of an adult Messiah is too confronting. Our irrational fears get kicked up, resistances shut doors, our self-esteem loses its pretend mask, and we turn away from looking more deeply into our insufficiencies. The image of a newborn infant unlocks our hearts and gives us great possibilities and hopes. He does not demand anything of us except to love him and this is the essential starting point. His presence teaches us to allow our love to grow. Each year we can accept him more lovingly into our heart and we become more familiar with him. Someplace deep within us rejoices because he is lovable and we know one day we will depend on him and he will remember the way we loved him when he was first given to us.

Quote for the Week

From Isaiah 35:

Here is your God, he comes with vindication;
with divine recompense he comes to save you.
Then will the eyes of the blind be opened,
the ears of the deaf be cleared;
then will the lame leap like a stag,
then the tongue of the mute will sing.

Themes for this Week’s Masses

First Reading: We go far back into Scripture to the Book of Numbers when we read the oracle of Balaam that foretells a star shall advance from Jacob and a staff shall rise from Israel. The minor prophet Zephaniah foretells that messianic salvation will come to the poor. The tyrant will fall and the humble and lowly ones will take refuge in the Lord. Isaiah relays the words of the Creator God who sustains the world. Israel will find vindication in the Lord. The Lord has not forgotten you for he calls you back and will greet you with tenderness. As we enter the "O" Antiphon days, the readings hasten to the nativity story. Genesis tells the story of Jacob declaring the scepter shall never depart from Judah. Jeremiah tells us the Lord will raise up a righteous shoot to David.

Gospel: The chief priests question the origin of Jesus and find themselves in a bind. They cannot publicly decide whether John the Baptist's origin in divine or human either. Jesus continues to talk about the kingdom of heaven as a place where sinners like tax collectors and prostitutes are entering before the religious leaders. As people try to figure out if Jesus is the Messiah, he sends a message back to the Baptist that reveals that Scripture is being fulfilled in this instance. Jesus upholds John as the greatest one born of humanity, but the least in the kingdom of God is greater than John. With the "O" Antiphon days, the readings hasten to the nativity story beginning with Matthews genealogy of Joseph who becomes the adoptive father of Jesus. Joseph dreams that the Lord has told him that his wife's conception of a son is of divine origin and that he is to accept her as his own wife.

Saints of the Week

Monday: Lucy, martyr (d. 304), was a Sicilian noble who was martyred in the Diocletian persecution. Since her name is translated as "light," many festivals of light are held in her honor, especially in Scandinavia. A Middle Age custom developed to pray to Lucy to remedy blindness and sight abnormalities.

Tuesday: John of the Cross, priest and doctor, (1542-1591), was a Carmelite priest who is known for his association with Teresa of Avila. As her spiritual director, he helped her reform the order and create the reformed Discalced (without shoes) Carmelites. His Order imprisoned him because of his reforms. In imprisonment, he wrote on spirituality, some of which became classics. Some of his books are: The Dark Night of the Soul, The Living Flame of Love, The Ascent of Mount Carmel, and the Spiritual Canticles.

Friday: The "O" Antiphon Days begin on Friday, December 17th and continue until Christmas Eve. These days represent the titles given to Jesus, the Messiah, and hasten our attention toward the wondrous events of Christmas. The song "O Come, O Come, Emmanuel" has developed from the O Antiphon titles.

This Week in Jesuit History

• Dec 12, 1661. In the College of Clermont, Paris, Fr. James Caret publicly defended the doctrine of papal infallibility, causing great excitement among the Gallicans and Jansenists.
• Dec 13, 1545. The opening of the Council of Trent to which Frs. Laynez and Salmeron were sent as papal theologians and Fr. Claude LeJay as theologian of Cardinal Otho Truchses.
• Dec 14, 1979. The death of Riccardo Lombardi, founder of the Better World Movement.
• Dec 15, 1631. At Naples, during an earthquake and the eruption of Mount Vesuvius, the Jesuits worked to help all classes of people.
• Dec 16, 1544. Francis Xavier entered Cochin.
• Dec 17, 1588. At Paris, Fr. Henry Walpole was ordained.
• Dec 18, 1594. At Florence, the apparition of St Ignatius to St Mary Magdalen de' Pazzi.

Our Lady of Guadalupe

Since Our Lady of Guadalupe falls on a Sunday in Advent, it is superseded by the Lord's Day. Many communities will celebrate her on Saturday, as Saturdays are dedicate to the mom of Jesus. Let us pray for the people of Mexico (and for all) who gain strength through Guadalupe's intercession. Mary's appearance to the native Mexican Juan Diego was the first known visitation in the New World. Let us pray for Mary's continued care of the poor and for all those who seek her protection.

Gaudete Sunday (Rejoice)

Today is Gaudete Sunday, which means Rejoice. It means we are halfway through Advent and we can begin to look for the signs of our Savior's birth. God's plan for redemption is unfolding and we are more attentive to the signs and symbols of the season. In fact, the "O" Antiphon Days begin on Friday, December 17th when our Scriptures hasten to tell the narrative of Joseph and Mary's journey to Bethlehem.

The traditional purple/dark blue of Advent is interrupted with a rose pink color to signify that some profound action is occurring. The increasing amount of light from the third Advent candle is illuminating our darkness. Our expectation can build and our patient waiting is filled with greater anticipation. We rejoice because the tangible story of the nativity is coming to life once again. Our salvation is at hand and God's glory is to be revealed.

Prayer: "The Hungering Dark" by Frederick Buechner

Lord Jesus Christ, Prince of Peace, be born again into our world. Wherever there is war in this world, wherever there is pain, wherever there is loneliness, wherever there is no hope, come, thou long-expected one, with healing in thy wings.

Holy Child, whom the shepherds and the kings and the dumb beasts adored, be born again. Wherever there is boredom, wherevere there is fear of failure, wherever there is temptation too strong to resist, wherever there is bitterness of heart, come, thou blessed one, with healing in thy wings.