"As Mary's Time Drew Near"

Traditionally this is a day of prayer and fasting.  While normally the actual feast might be celebrated after evening prayer, we will have our first vigil Liturgy at 4:00 p.m.  It will be a huge Mass.  We will have roughly four hundred people here easily.  Of course part of the reason is that we have our children's choir doing our music.  Children plus Christmas equals cute, so we have lot's of families coming here to watch the children.  Ours is also the earliest of the neighboring parishes, so people can go to families or travel tomorrow without having to go to Mass first.

I mention these things because I consider the other people in the story of Christmas who are just sort of there.  As all of these marvelous events were occurring, did they all give praise and glory to God.  I think not.  I have met some people down through the years who love to complain and whine.  I have often thought that if Jesus were to show up in all of his glory, they would be bothered by the noise of the angels, or would be disappointed in the seeming lack of mystery and majesty.  So even back in the day, many folks may have had the experience but missed the meaning.

The potion from St. Augustine's homily, from the Office of Readings, almost sounds like St. Paul.  Prepare yourselves for the coming of the Lord.  We might yawn because we have heard those words so often, but there is a real necessity to constantly call one another to conversion and discipleship.  Consider the apostles who were so close to the activity of Jesus Christ, yet Matthew and Mark will present them as men who often misunderstood what Jesus was about.

One of the first times I went to the Holy Land, I remember standing at the Mount of Olives looking out over Jerusalem, considering Mathew's passage of Jesus crying over the ancient city.  As I stood there I thought about that day when Jesus and his disciples made several treks between that city and the garden.  An ongoing reflection, meditation, and contemplation raises our awareness and draws us closer to those ah ha moments.  Someday hopefully the moms and dads who are recording the cute moments of their child, might be moved by a song, a reading, or the Sacraments.

Isaiah's prose, "A people who have walked in darkness have seen a great light," is the inspiration of my homily this Christmas.  There is a lot of darkness around us.  If anything I hope that this Christmas challenges faith-filled people to share the story of the Incarnation by faithful living, stewardship, and discipleship. We should walk to Mass this Christmas with our Baptismal candles in hand and re-commit ourselves to the light of the world who scatters the darkness of Sin and Evil.

Our time of salvation draws near.