Homily for 2d Sunday of Advent

Homily for the
2d Sunday of AdventDec. 5, 2010
Matt 3: 1-12
Willow Towers, New Rochelle

“Produce good fruit as evidence of your repentance” (Matt 3: 8).

During Advent we look to 3 comings of our Lord Jesus Christ: his glorious coming at the end of history, to reward the just, punish the wicked, and complete his work of redemption; his humble coming in history as a babe born in a stable and as a wandering Galilean preacher, to start his work of redemption; and his coming in the here and now to us by grace, carrying on his work of redemption.

The Scriptures of the last 2 Sundays—feast of Christ the King and the 1st of Advent—focused entirely on his glorious coming. This Sunday the focus starts to shift: our 1st reading (Is 11:1-10) and the responsorial psalm (72) continue to look toward the 2d Coming, when God will make all things right, put all things into the original order of creation; our 2d (Rom 15:4-9) and 3rd readings turn to the here and now, to our response to the message that Jesus of Nazareth announced in the days of his 1st coming among us.

For the 1st time in this Advent season, today we meet John the Baptist, 1 of the 3 dominant figures of every Advent. (The others are the prophet Isaiah, source of most of our 1st readings at both Sunday and weekday Masses, and the Virgin Mary.) John appears suddenly out of the desert, out of nowhere, preaching repentance (3:1). He comes dressed like the great Old Testament prophet Elijah, who also lived in the desert and called upon Israel to repent of their sins.

There’s no doubt that John is calling for Israel to turn away from sin: People from everywhere “were going out to him and were being baptized by him in the Jordan River as they acknowledged their sins” (3:5-6). He addresses the Pharisees and Sadducees, the leaders of Israel, as a “brood of vipers … fleeing from the coming wrath” (3:7), and he warns them that an ax is about to hack them down as barren trees (3:10). It’s not nice, polite language, and the prophet doesn’t regard them as nice people, as friends of the Lord God Almighty whose kingdom is about to burst among them: “the kingdom of heaven is at hand!” (3:2).

In the last week we’ve heard a lot about a presidential commission charged with addressing the nation’s financial woes. The commission came up with a lot of recommendations. And no one was surprised that those who’ve been paying attention aren’t happy with some of the recommendations. Everyone thinks that the humongous deficits of our federal government should be eliminated by someone else’s pain: don’t raise my taxes, and don’t cut back the spending from which I benefit. The source of the problem lies elsewhere, not with me.

It’s like that when prophets show up and call for repentance. All those others, all those sinners—they’re the ones he’s talking to. Remember the parable of the 2 men who went up to the Temple to pray, which was our gospel on the 30th Sunday of Ordinary Time, 6 weeks ago (Luke 18:9-14)? The Pharisee, one of the “good people,” the “nice people” of Jesus’ time, prayed to God by thanking him that he, the Pharisee, wasn’t like the rest of men but did so many good deeds that—he almost says—he really deserved God’s gratitude. So many of us tend to think like that.

But it’s exactly those “good people,” those “nice people,” those “respectable people” whom John the Baptist is addressing today. The call to repent is addressed to everyone. “Don’t presume to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father’” (Matt 3:9). Don’t think that just because you’re a Catholic, just because you go to church, just because over the years you’ve put a few bucks into the collection, that God’s pleased with you. John tells the Pharisees and Sadducees, and everyone else who comes to hear his preaching and to be baptized in the river, to “produce good fruit as evidence of your repentance,” as evidence that you’re God’s children. If you’re turning away from sin, it’s got to show in how you act!

Because the one who’s coming to introduce God’s kingdom is coming in judgment. “He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire” (3:11). The Holy Spirit will reveal hearts, showing men and women in all their reality. The fire will purify the just and burn to cinders the wicked. Those who’ve produced good fruits, godly fruits, will be reaped into the barn of God’s harvest, and the wicked, the barren, will be incinerated in an eternal fire (3:12).

So what fruits does God expect? What are the fruits of repentance? St. Paul today mentions “harmony with one another, in keeping with Christ Jesus” (Rom 15:5). The responsorial psalm spoke of “pity for the lowly and the poor” (72:13). Elsewhere Paul speaks of the fruits of the Holy Spirit: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control (cf. Gal 5:22-23). How we treat one another, how we forgive one another, how we live with one another is the fruit of our inner selves, of our virtue or lack of it. It’s to growth in such virtues that John the Baptist is calling us today, to prepare the way in our hearts for the Lord’s coming.

Photo: Painting of St. John the Baptist, Cathedral of St. John the Baptist, Turin