This week’s memory verse: Walk in wisdom toward outsiders, making the best use of the time. — Colossians 4:5
Pray the Week: Lord Jesus, keep before me constant awareness of Your immanence. As I celebrate Your birth in time may I also recognize Your coming return. Help me to be prepared through patient preparation. Amen.
When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the infant leaped in her womb, and Elizabeth, filled with the Holy Spirit, cried out in a loud voice and said, “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb.”
We have arrived at the last of the four Sundays of Advent, and we continue to contemplate Advent and all its implications in these last few days.
As mentioned over the past three weeks, Advent has several shades of meaning. It can mean beginning, revelation, expectation, dawning, and a start. Throughout this season we are led through the various ways we will prepare for and encounter Jesus in this new Church year.
In the first week of Advent, we focused on our preparation for Jesus’ return. In the second week we focused on our personal preparation for needed changes in our lives. Last week we focused on proactive preparation for the Kingdom through our efforts at evangelizing the gospel message of freedom, forgiveness, and new life both verbally and by the signals we send through the way we live out our daily lives. We are to invite others by the way we live differently and are different.
Today, we hear of Mary’s journey to see her cousin Elizabeth and Elizabeth and her unborn baby’s reaction to the visit. Both are filled with the Holy Spirit and in action and by words they leap for joy.
Mary, Elizabeth, and Elizabeth’s husband Zachariah were well aware of the long-awaited promise of the Messiah and now – here He is.
This awareness and its meaning are expressed by both Mary and Zachariah in the Canticles they proclaim, the Magnificat and Benedictus.
If you are unfamiliar with these, take a chance in these last few days of Advent to look them up. We clergy know them quite well since they are prayed daily in the Liturgy of the Hours.
This daily recitation keeps the immanence of Jesus’ return before us. This is our last of the four ways to prepare for Jesus’ return, keeping His immanence ever before us.
Take the prayer “Patient Trust” by the great philosopher and theologian Teilhard de Chardin to heart: Above all, trust in the slow work of God. We are quite naturally impatient in everything to reach the end without delay. We should like to skip the intermediate stages. We are impatient of being on the way to something unknown, something new… Give our Lord the benefit of believing that His hand is leading you, and accept the anxiety of feeling yourself in suspense and incomplete while we await Him.
This week’s memory verse: Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. — Colossians 3:2
Pray the Week: Lord Jesus, grant me a spirit of proactive preparation for Your return. Assist me in witnessing to Your Kingdom life in both word and action, by example. Help me to be focused and resolute. Amen.
The crowds asked John the Baptist, “What should we do?”
We have arrived at the third of the four Sundays of Advent, and we continue to contemplate Advent and all its implications.
As mentioned over the past two weeks, Advent has several shades of meaning. It can mean beginning, revelation, expectation, dawning, and a start. Throughout this season we are led through the various ways we will prepare for and encounter Jesus in this new Church year.
In the first week of Advent, we focused on our preparation for Jesus’ return. Last week we focused on our personal preparation for needed changes in our lives through repentance, penance, and reform.
Today, the people who have been hearing John call for change and preparation ask him what they are to do.
John lists some key areas pf personal reform, but it is not for the sake of reform itself, but in preparation for the Kingdom of God. John preached good news to the people. It was the good news of the gospel message that would come from Jesus.
Preparation is about being proactive. We are to take the steps necessary for the revelation of the Kingdom life to people who do not know it.
Think about what John was asking of his inquirers: share in your clothing and food, stop stealing, stop extorting and accusing. People never saw such a thing. Everyone had their expectations of how people would be, how selfish they would be, but now something had changed, and people were changed.
We are not to get distracted in our proactive preparation for the Kingdom. The people around John, having heard his message, and charged with what they were to do, got quickly lost. They sat around, engaging in speculation – kind of like wondering what the drones are – and John quickly calls them back by pointing to the reality of the Messiah.
What we are to do is take account of these three calls for preparation: to be ready for Jesus’ return in glory, to have undertaken personal reform in our lives, and to be those who are being proactive in showing forth the Kingdom.
What are we to do? Let people know by evangelizing the gospel message of freedom, forgiveness, and new life. Make efforts both verbally and by the signals we send through the way we live out our daily lives of what it means to be in the Kingdom. Let others encounter the unexpected from us because we live differently and are different from those in the kingdom of the world. And, finally, remain focused on what is truly important
Join us this Christmas Season and celebrate the continuing birth of Jesus in our lives.
All services are at the parish at 1040 Pearl Street in Schenectady.
This week’s memory verse: But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To him be the glory both now and to the day of eternity. Amen. — 2 Peter 3:18
Pray the Week: Lord Jesus, grant me a spirit of active preparation for Your return. Assist me in taking account of where I am along Your path. Fill me with the grace needed to reform areas lacking and to grow into You. Amen.
John went throughout the whole region of the Jordan, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins,
We have arrived at the second of the four Sundays of Advent, and we continue to contemplate the Advent and all its implications.
As mentioned last week, Advent has several shades of meaning. It can mean beginning, revelation, expectation, dawning, and a start. Throughout this season we are led through the various ways we will prepare for and encounter Jesus in this new Church year.
Last week we focused on our preparation for Jesus’ return. This week we focus on personal preparation for needed changes in our lives.
Today we encounter a key figure in these days of preparation, John the Baptist, the Forerunner of Jesus the Messiah.
The importance of John the Baptist is underscored by the number of times the Holy Church honors him throughout the year. There is this season of Advent when we hear his proclamation of preparation through repentance, his baptism of Jesus celebrated in the Christmas season, his nativity on June 24th, and his beheading on August 29th. We encounter him in the various gospels during the year. He is always pointing toward Jesus.
Forerunner, literally one who comes before another, underscores the call to personal preparation. While Advent is not a deeply penitential season, as Lent is, we are still called to pause to increase penance and prayer to prepare for Jesus’ return. It is a time of checking our personal books to see where our accounts are.
Are we rich in the graces Jesus offers us? Are our ledgers full of good works, generosity, and the proclamation of the Kingdom? Are there indications that we have spoken out, as John did, against wrong and evil, or are we at a deficit in any of these areas?
If there are deficits, it is an opportune season to close them out, to repent, do penance, increase prayer and good works, and move from the red into the black.
As part of our preparation, look at some old Christmas movies. You will generally see the decoration of the Christmas tree on the eve of Christmas day. Can you imagine? Does anybody still wait?
What the symbolism of those movies calls us to is making this a season of the forerunner, that which comes before the next. Are we taking a breath, slowing the headlong rush, easing anxiety, and enjoying this blessed Advent time of preparation? Doing so helps us best appreciate what we are preparing for. Then we can celebrate the full forty days of Christmas well prepared.
And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.
In so many ways we are in a time of preparation. There were preparations for Halloween, All Saints and All Souls Days, Thanksgiving, and we now prepare for Advent, the Nativity of the Lord, the New Year, and Epiphany. It truly is a wonder we get it all done. On top of that are our weekly preparations, work, normal shopping, cleaning, and cooking as well as the good works we do with our Food Pantry partnership and our CarePortal work that serves families in crisis. With all that understood, it comes down to approach. I have learned through many a lesson in the pitfalls of forgetfulness that a well documented list of to-dos helps. I like making shopping lists, or taking the ones sent me (can you pick up some milk on your way home) and then deleting the items as I accomplish them. Gives one a certain sense of satisfaction. On top of all the preparing and accomplishing we tend to be influenced by expectation. I know that too – remembering the search for Cabbage Patch dolls and Teddy Ruxpin – and that was when there was no online shopping outlets.
I am not going to deride the preparations, the work involved, or even the expectations around us. The work is typically done with love and concern, a way to make our loved ones’ days brighter, an effort to ease their burdens in life. The expectations are really a call from the heart – a desire to be seen and acknowledged – to be loved.
Jesus did the same and asks the same. Let us be careful to ensure He is on our lists and let us make every effort not to cross Him off the list. Let us be careful so that when Christmas arrives we are not surprised, shocked, or whispering to ourselves – that went so fast. Our efforts done out of love for Him need to reflect all He has done and continues to do for us. From His incarnation to His death it was all for us. Let our lives then be all for Him and His gospel way. Prepare, He is near.
Welcome to our December 2024 Newsletter. It is indeed a time of preparation as we begin a new Church Year on December 1st with the First Sunday of Advent. The Opłatki (Christmas Wafers) and Advent Wreath are prepared. As the new liturgical year begins we look forward to all our Advent activities and our entry into the Christmas season.
Join us for Rorate Holy Masses by candlelight on Wednesday mornings at 7:30am. We have an American Goulash sale on Sunday, December 8th starting at 11:30am. Get your pre-orders by clicking here. We hold our annual Vigil / Wigilia Dinner on Sunday, December 15th after 10am Holy Mass. We hold our Greening of the Church on Sunday, December 22nd. Fr. Jim celebrates his 10th anniversary of his ordination to the Holy Priesthood on December 6th.
We continue in our charitable works with our food and clothing collections. Join in to support our music director and the Thursday Musical Club as they perform Night Divine at the First Reformed Church of Schenectady on Saturday, December 7th at 2pm. Get a Memory Cross for the parish Christmas Tress in memory of a departed loved one. There are still Christmas Vigil tickets available. If all 100 sell the prize will be $2,500. You can also get advance tickets for the Valentine’s Raffle supporting our parish youth – put one in a card to someone.
Please remember annual dues and Epiphany home blessings. …and, see what else Fr. Jim is up to.
All this and more in our December 2024 Newsletter.
This week’s memory verse: Wait for the Lord; be strong, and let your heart take courage; wait for the Lord! — Psalm 27:14
Pray the Week: Lord Jesus, grant me a spirit of active waiting in preparation for Your return. As I look to the East, for the new dawn of Your day, strengthen me and keep me from drowsiness and anxiety. Amen.
“And then they will see the Son of Man coming in a cloud with power and great glory.”
Welcome and Happy Church New Year.
For months we have talked about our seven summer Sundays and Jesus’ instruction on how we, who receive Him, are to live out our lives.
Advent brings a change in direction and focus. We have four Sundays to contemplate the word Advent and all its implications.
Advent has several shades of meaning. It can mean beginning, revelation, expectation, dawning, and a start. Throughout this season we will be led through the various ways we will prepare for and encounter Jesus in this new year.
This week we focus on our Advent preparation for Jesus’ return. Jesus instructs us on how we are to act and react on that day.
Jesus tells us that our reaction to His return in glory is to be assured, and confident. We are not to fear His return or the judgment He will impose. He tells us to stand erect and raise our heads because our redemption is at hand. That confidence comes from our preparation and active waiting.
Active waiting is something we engage in. We are not sitting idle nor are we being passive. Our faith tells us that preparation and active waiting require a constant state of action and movement – working and pushing the expected fulfillment of the Kingdom forward.
Jesus reminds us that engaging in preparation and active waiting will keep us from both drowsiness (i.e., sitting idle or just giving up) and anxiety (i.e., fear from dwelling on the wrong things and expecting the worst things).
So, He says: “Be vigilant at all times and pray for strength.”
St. Paul reminds us that our Christian family life centered on love will be the very thing that strengthens us. Think about that. When we actively love through words and deeds, through outreach, evangelism, and charity we have no time for drowsiness, no room for anxiety. It is key, as St. Paul says to conduct ourselves to please God.
Jesus is returning in glory. The preparation and active waiting of Advent urges us to participate purposefully in Jesus’ call to transformation, so we are ready for the day of His return. We must not be passive or drowsy or unfocused, but engaged, reflective, and growing in the waiting each and every moment.
Let us then prepare for Jesus’ return, the needed changes in our lives, growth in our evangelism and Jesus’ immediate immanence.