Homily - 6 December 2009

The Second Sunday of Advent (C)

Dear brother and sisters,

Over the past several weeks we have seen here an increase in the number of people attending Sunday Mass. I gladly welcome the return of so many - as I know you do as well – and with Saint Paul I pray “that your love may increase ever more and more in knowledge and every kind of perception, to discern what is of value, so that you may be pure and blameless for the day of Christ” (Philippians 1:9-10).

It is this “day of Christ,” his glorious return at the end of time, for which Holy Mother Church seeks to prepare us through the observance of the season of Advent. She teaches us to be ever vigilant because we do not know the day or the hour of his return (cf. Matthew 24:36). How, then, do we best prepare ourselves to welcome the Lord when at last when he comes? We do so by heeding the cry of the Forerunner of the Lord, Saint John the Baptist, to “repentance for the forgiveness of sins” (Luke 3:3).

If we are to repent of our sins we must “discern what is of value” and what can be more valuable than the very reason for which we have gathered here today: the Body and Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Saint Paul warns us sternly that we must receive the Eucharist in a worthy manner:

Whoever therefore, eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of profaning the body and blood of the Lord. Let a man examine himself, and so eat of the bread and drink of the cup. For anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the body eats and drinks judgment on himself (I Corinthians 11:27-29).

It is this admonition that tempers my joy at the return of so many with a deep sadness, for I fear that many who have returned after being away from the Holy Mass for so long have been receiving Holy Communion without first making a sincere sacramental confession.

We know that purposefully missing Mass on Sundays and holy days is mortally sinful and that receiving the Eucharist when not in the state of grace – as the Apostle instructs us – compounds the gravity of the situation with the sin of sacrilege.

This concerns me greatly. When I was appointed your pastor I was entrusted with the care of your souls and my chief duty is to do what I can to help you grow in holiness and lead you to heaven. I implore you most earnestly to examine your lives before receiving Holy Communion, lest you eat and drink judgment on yourself.

My brothers and sisters, this is a most serious situation and I urge you with all my heart to get to confession as soon as possible. I urge you to do so because “God has commanded that every lofty mountain be made low, and that the age-old depths and gorges be filled to level ground, that Israel may advance secure in the glory of God” (Baruch 5:7). We must tear down the mountain of our pride, with the Lord’s help, that he might “remove the things that hinder us from receiving Christ with joy.”

In these holy days, as we prepare for the day the day when “all flesh shall see the salvation of God” (Luke 3:6), let us beg the Lord for the grace of true repentance that the words of the Psalmist might be fulfilled in us: “Although they go forth weeping, carrying the seed to be sown, they shall come back rejoicing, carrying their sheaves” (Psalm 126:6).

When we enter the confessional we enter carrying the seeds of our repentance, the tears of sorrow for having failed to return the love of the Lord Jesus Christ in neglecting the love of God and of neighbor. After our encounter with the Lord, the fruit of the seeds we have sown, we carry the sheaves of the grace and mercy of God.

Inside the confessional, the penitent soul “take[s] off [the] robe of mourning and misery” (Baruch 5:1) and the Lord purifies the baptismal garment, making it “white as snow” (Isaiah 1:18), and clothes the penitent with “the splendor of God” and “the glory of the eternal name” (Baruch 5:1, 2).

This great Sacrament commonly goes by three names: Confession, Penance and Reconciliation.

It is called confession because that is what happens. The penitent confesses the sins he or she has committed in kind and in number, as best as can recalled.

It is also called penance, because a penance is given to the penitent as a means of demonstrating sorrow for his or her sins and as way to try to make right what was made wrong, however large or small the penance may be.

This Sacrament is also – and more commonly in our day - called reconciliation because through it we are reconciled with God and with one another because the Lord himself removes what stands between us and him and each other. We are able to raise our eyes to God and to look each other in the eyes again because through the Sacrament the obstacles are taken away by the grace of God.

Let us examine ourselves in these holy days that we might be filled with the joy of the Lord and stand pure and blameless before him. Through our reception of the sacraments may he “teach us to judge wisely the things of earth and to love the things of heaven,” that when he comes again we may lift our eyes to him in joy and behold the power, the splendor and the loveliness of his face. Amen!