4. First Wednesday of Advent

Meditations no. 4 (unofficial computer-aided translation)

Hope in our Lord’s coming. Preparing to receive the greatest proof of God’s infinite love.

Come, Lord, and make no delay. As we pray, we are filled with eagerness for the coming of Christ, the long-awaited Messiah, our Redeemer. The Lord is coming to save his people; happy are those prepared to meet him.

For many centuries the people’s hopes were fixed on the coming of the Redeemer. We share in that same longing now. Seeing the mystery of his Birth so near, we want to be set ablaze with the same desires for redemption.

Through the Incarnation of his only-begotten Son, God has shown us his unbounded love. St Augustine asks: Why did the Lord come, if not to show his love for us? His is a Father’s love, for God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law … so that we might receive adoption as sons.

Jesus comes to this earth to fill us with graces. St John Chrysostom portrays him as saying to us: I ask no payment at all for what I am giving you. I would rather be in debt to you, because you will put me in your debt by taking everything I have to offer. To what can this honour be compared? I am your father, brother, spouse, home, food, clothing; I am your root and foundation. I am everything your heart desires. Do not think you lack anything. I will even be your servant: “I have come to serve and not to be served.” I am your friend, your member and head, your brother, sister and mother. I am all things; all I desire is the intimacy of your love. Look at me, impoverished for you, a beggar for you, crucified for you, buried for you. In heaven I stand in God’s presence on your behalf. On earth I am his envoy to you. And you are everything to me: my brother and co-heir, my friend and member. What more could you want?

This outpouring of God’s goodness should make us grateful and eager to respond. Our Father tells us: In considering the circumstances surrounding your decision to make every effort to live your faith, I imagine that you, like me, will thank our Lord. I know too that, without falling into false humility, this thankfulness will leave you even more convinced that you have merited nothing of this on your own …

I don’t like to speak of someone being singled out to form part of a privileged elect. But it is Christ who speaks, Christ who chooses. It is the language of Holy Scripture: elegit nos in ipso ante mundi constitutionem ut essemus sancti; he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy, St Paul tells us. I know that such thoughts don’t fill you with pride, nor lead you to think yourself better than others. That choice, the root of our vocation, should be the basis of our humility.

How the just men and women of Israel awaited the Lord.

The Jewish people had to wait what must have seemed an eternity for the arrival of the promised Messiah. Many centuries passed before the Messiah came. The patriarchs and the prophets prayed and prayed, and with them the entire people of Israel, saying: the earth thirsts for you; come, Lord! God wanted this insistent “prayer of the just” to be offered, before the Word became flesh.

However, not everyone waited with the same good dispositions. In fact, it was thanks to a number of men and women raised by God from among his people that the torch of hope was kept alight. As for the rest, their faint-hearted straying, their infidelity and indifference, are well known. As soon as adversity arose, or their journey lasted longer than expected, they fell to distrusting their leaders and even their God. With their own hands they built idols and worshipped them. They have turned aside quickly out of the way which I commanded them; they have made for themselves a molten calf, and have worshipped it, the Lord complained. The reason for their behaviour is found in Jesus’ words: This people honours me with their lips, but their heart is far from me.

In sharp contrast to this pharisaical approach was the attitude of those who were looking for the consolation of Israel. They were simple people, most of them unknown to us, who served God worshipping with fasting and prayer night and day. In silence and love they waited, their hearts aglow in expectation of the Messiah. First and foremost among them was the Virgin Mary, together with the just man called Joseph. There was Elizabeth; and there were the shepherds in the neighbourhood of Bethlehem, and Simeon, and Anna, and the Magi… Though all very different, they were united in their hoping for the Redeemer. Their days were filled with prayer, faith and love, which made them eager to go out to meet the Lord.

As we count the days to Jesus’ Birth, we should foster our own hope. Our Father tells us that our Lord has entrusted us with the mission of attracting other souls to sanctity, encouraging them to get close to him, to feel united to the Church, to extend the kingdom of God to all hearts. Jesus wants to see us dedicated, faithful, responsive. He wants us to love him. It is his desire that we should be holy, very much his own …

The time of Advent is a time for hope. These great horizons of our Christian vocation, this unity of life built on the presence of God our Father, can and ought to be a daily reality.

How we should wait for him. Jesus comes daily in the Eucharist.

This season of Advent is a continual summons to hope. Our Lord is very near. He wants to live more fully in our hearts. “Come, Lord,” we tell him, “our hearts are waiting for you.” We long to prepare ourselves to receive him worthily. Through our love, shown in deeds, we want to erase the record of past infidelities. Your holy impatience to serve God does not displease him. But it will be fruitless if it is not accompanied by a real improvement in your daily conduct.

In the First Reading at today’s Mass, taken from the Book of Isaiah, we hear of a promise of the messianic banquet, which God is preparing for mankind. On this mountain the Lord of hosts will make for all peoples a feast of fat things, a feast of wine on the lees, of fat things full of marrow, of wine on the lees well refined. And he will destroy on this mountain the covering that is cast over all peoples, the veil that is spread over all nations. He will swallow up death for ever, and the Lord God will wipe away tears from all faces, and the reproach of his people he will take away from all the earth; for the Lord has spoken. It will be said on that day, “Lo, this is our God; we have waited for him, that he might save us. This is the Lord; we have waited for him; let us be glad and rejoice in his salvation.”

This divine feast becomes a reality each day at Holy Communion. Just as we await him in the stable at Bethlehem, so we should look forward to our daily meeting with Jesus in the Eucharist. This is the purpose of our night period, a time which we should try to fill with desires of receiving our Lord more lovingly when he comes into our soul.

Have you ever thought how you would prepare to receive our Lord if you could go to communion only once in your life?

We must be thankful to God that he makes it so easy for us to come to him: but we should show our gratitude by preparing ourselves to receive him very well.

If we want to apply our Father’s words more effectively to our lives, now is the right moment for us to make the resolution to intensify our spirit of recollection, especially during the hours leading up to Holy Mass and Communion. A contemplative soul relishes the silence of the night; it becomes something indispensable. We should fill these hours with frequent spiritual communions, to express our daily eagerness to receive our Lord, in union with Mary: I wish, Lord, to receive you with the purity, humility and devotion with which your most holy Mother received you, with the spirit and fervour of the saints.

Ask our Lady, along with me, our Father says, to make it come true. Try to imagine how she spent these months, waiting for her Son to be born. And our Lady, Holy Mary, will make of you alter Christus, ipse Christus: another Christ, Christ himself!