From Season to Season

  Stay awake and be ready! For you do not know on what day your Lord will come. —Entrance Antiphon for the 32 nd Sunday in Ordinary Time, based on Matthew 24:42a, 44   Like many early Christians, including Saint Paul and the people of Thessaloniki , the Evangelist Matthew and his community would probably have struggled to reconcile their hope for the return of Jesus with their disappointment that it hadn’t happened yet. For most of us, the eschaton —the Second Coming of Christ and the Final Judgment—is an uncomfortable topic that might even smack of religious fanaticism. After all, how often have we dismissed religious leaders and self-proclaimed “prophets” who have declared that Jesus will return at a specific time and place? And yet, each Sunday, as we profess in the Nicene Creed, we declare our belief that “he will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead.” The Catechism of the Catholic Church develops this fundamental Christian doctrine when it s...

Watch, therefore; you do not know when the Lord of the house is coming, whether in the evening, or at midnight, or at cockcrow, or in the morning. May he not come suddenly and find you sleeping. What I say to you, I say to all: “Watch!” —Mark 13:35-37 If there is one thing that can be said about the season of Advent, it is this: Advent is not Christmas. The blue-purples of vestments, hangings, and candles, the emphasis on preparation and expectation in Advent Scripture readings and carols, and the pervasive themes of judgment, restoration, and re-creation have little to do with the sights and sounds that fill shopping malls, homes, too many churches, and most hearts these days. We love Christmas and our secular culture, which really only gives a polite nod to the seasons and feast of the Christian Year, has enabled us to forget that we can really only celebrate the new-born light of Christmas after we have dwelt in the darkness of Advent. Sadly, we church types aren’t all t...

I, John, saw in heaven another sign, great and awe-inspiring: seven angels with the seven last plagues, for through them God’s fury is accomplished. Then I saw something like a sea of glass mingled with fire. On the sea of glass were standing those who had won the victory over the beast and its image and the number that signified its name. They were holding God’s harps, and they sang the song of Moses, the servant of God, and the song of the Lamb: “Great and wonderful are your works, Lord God almighty.” —Revelation 15:1-3b In these final days of the Church Year, the daily Readings present images of plagues, persecution, and parousia . They certainly stand in stark contrast with the festive Thanksgiving spirit that we try to claim as a nation, even as families hurry through their holiday meals to rush out for Black Friday deals… on Thanksgiving.    The mix of the end-of-times language and imagery presented by our liturgy and the abundance of Thanksgivi...