Sunday, December 10, 2017 2nd Sunday of Advent
1st Reading: Is 40:1-5, 9-11
2nd Reading: 2 Pt 3:8-14
Gospel: Mk 1:1-8
This is the beginning of the Good News of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. It is written in the book of Isaiah, the prophet, “I am sending my messenger ahead of you to prepare your way. Let the people hear the voice calling in the desert: Prepare the way of the Lord, level his paths.”
So John began to baptize in the desert; he preached a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. All Judea and all the people from the city of Jerusalem went out to John to confess their sins and be baptized by him in the river Jordan.
John was clothed in camel’s hair and wore a leather garment around his waist. His food was locusts and honey. He preached to the people saying, “After me comes one who is more powerful than I am; I have baptized you with water, but he will baptize you in the Holy Spirit.”
D@iGITAL-EXPERIENCE
(Daily Gospel in the Assimilated Life Experience)
While Christmas is only a commemoration of Jesus’ historical coming, there are compelling reasons why our preparations shouldn’t just be ceremonial. Among the reasons is the possibility that He will come again in an event called “the end of time”. With our ailing environment making itself felt more forcefully through calamities of surprising magnitude, the cosmic end is no longer a game of doomsday prophets. We have to take the warning of the end of time seriously. Those who refuse to take this seriously will do better if they think about their death. Whether it is the end of time or the end of life in death, one needs to be prepared for its eventuality. It is wise then to take Advent seriously as a death drill similar to the fire drill or earthquake drill we introduce in schools. As fire and earthquake can strike when least expected, death could strike anytime, Christmas or no Christmas!
This takes us to the urgency of John the Baptist’s message of repentance. Repentance is about sin, and sin is about the self we have enthroned in our hearts after ejecting God. This play of the word “sin” is instructive. The letter “I” in the middle of this word stands for what Sigmund Freud calls the “ID” – that set of uncoordinated instinctual trends in a person in Freud’s structural model of the psyche. When this big “I” stands between the S (self) and the N (neighbor), SIN prevails barring the Lord’s entry.
Advent is a time to prepare for the coming of the Lord whether in the event of the “end of time” or in the event of our own death. In whatever form the Lord comes, repentance dethrones the big “I” from our hearts, giving way to Christ who comes to us in any manner he deems appropriate. –(Atty.) Rev. Fr. Dan Domingo P. delos Angeles, Jr., DM.
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