ADVENT -- Visualizing Peace for the New Year

WHAT IS YOUR NEW CHURCH YEAR RESOLUTION?

 

Today begins a NEW CHURCH YEAR;  we know it's the Year of St. Matthew's Gospel;  Cycle  'A';  back at the beginning you might say.

 

When we look at our readings to begin this New Church Year,  Isaiah encourages us to visualize peace and let the ways of God be the guiding force in our lives:

 

     "They shall beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks;

      one nation shall not raise the sword against another,  nor shall they train for war again.

      Let us walk in the light of the Lord!"    

 

(What would peace look like for you if you visualized it?    Visualize a world of peace!)

 

 

Paul, writing to the Church of Rome, encouraged them and us:

 

     "Let us then throw off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light."  

 

 (Works and 'words' of darkness;   put on 'Light' -- who is the true 'Light of the World' that we can put on?) 

 

 

Jesus says in our first hearing of the Gospel of Matthew for the New Church Year:

 

     "Stay awake!   For you do not know on which day your Lord will come.

      You must be prepared, for at an hour you do not expect the Son of Man will come."

 

If Advent is a time of waiting for THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD,  what can we do to bring 'light' and not darkness into the world?   If Advent is a time when we hope for THE PRINCE OF PEACE to be born anew;  what does that means for you?  How is that to happen, if not somehow through our lives?   Should we not be about visualizing peace, being committed to peace, be somehow working for peace?

 

Patricia Sanchez, writing in a homily help for Preaching Resources for this First Sunday of Advent, has a reflection for us on something we can do to start the process of 'peace-making';  it starts inside us, disarming the weapons of war we give a home to there:

 

"While most of us may not wield swords and spears, we have sufficient weaponry in our arsenals to destroy one another.  We have words and looks and attitudes that cut deeper than any sword.   We have anger and resentment and prejudices that build unscalable walls and unbreachable barriers between us.   We have pride and selfishness that insist on making our way and our time the top priority in so many situations.   We also have apathy and insensitivity that blind us to the needs of others.  These are the weapons of war that must be disarmed before peace can grow and before our time is spent."

 

HAVE A BLESSED ADVENT AND A GREAT NEW CHURCH YEAR! 

           -- your Franciscan brothers in Ava; we are praying for you....pray for us, too!