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Second Sunday of Advent - December 7, 2003

When I hear today's Gospel, I think of the story of a country pastor who wanted to paint his church. In order to save a few dollars, he decided to thin the paint to make it go further. So one day everyone got together and the church was painted. When it was finished it looked very lovely indeed. However, that very night there was a big storm and a heavy downpour of rain. In the morning the pastor looked out and when he saw the church, the paint now looked streaked and faded. With a sad heart, he went into the church and prayed: "0 Lord, what am I to do?" And God answered his prayer. God said "Repaint and thin no more."

In today's Gospel, the call to repentance comes from the lips of John the Baptist. It was John's calling in life to be the herald who announced the coming of the promised Messiah. John referred to himself as "a voice crying in the wilderness: Prepare the way of the Lord. Make his paths straight." If we listen carefully to John, it becomes increasingly clear to us that it is not the Lord's path that need to be straightened, but ours!

John proclaimed a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. With a view to the Lord's coming, he pleaded with his fellow Jews: "Repent! Change your hearts! Change your behaviour. Turn your lives around! Be converted! John wanted people to recognize and to remove the obstacles that hindered them from experiencing God's coming into their lives. He wanted them to open up their hearts to God so that God might come to them and touch their lives with his grace and healing.

Inspired by the imagery of Isaiah before him, John called for valleys to be filled in, mountains to be leveled, winding ways to be straightened and rough roads to be made smooth. John was describing, not so much a natural landscape, as the landscape of the human heart. It is the winding and twisting ways of the human heart that need to be straightened out.

The call to repentance is just as urgent today as it was then. I received a fax a few days, a letter written purportedly by a homeless youth. It is too long to read it all, but here is some of what he wrote:

"The paradox of our time in history is that we have taller buildings but shorter tempers; we have wider freeways but narrower viewpoints; we spend more, but have less; we buy more, but enjoy it less. We have a bigger houses, but smaller families; more conveniences, but less time; we have more degrees, but less sense; more knowledge, but less judgment... We have multiplied our possessions, but reduced our values. We talk too much, love too seldom and hate too often. We've learned how to make a living but not a life; we have added years to life, but not life to years. We've been all the way to the moon and back but have trouble crossing the street to meet our neighbour.... We have [conquered] the atom, but not our prejudice. We have higher incomes, but lower morals... These are the times of steep profits, and shallow relationships; .... These are days of two incomes, but more divorce; of fancier houses, but broken homes." These are times when technology can bring this letter to you, and a time when you can choose either to make a difference ... or just hit delete."

What's your take on that? To me it sounds like a call to repentance. If John the Baptist were to come into our world today, I wonder if he would not speak to us from "the wilderness of the street."

Sin may have vanished from our vocabulary, but its reality hasn't vanished from our lives. You might recall the little line from the First Letter of John: "If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us" [I Jn. 1, 8].

By calling us to repentance, Advent invites us to an interior renewal of the heart. One way in which we as Catholics have experienced and celebrated this renewal of heart has been through the Sacrament of Reconciliation or what many of you who are older call Confession or the Sacrament of Penance.

In his Apostolic Letter, God's Mercy, Pope John Paul comments on some encouraging signs of the use of this Sacrament. "The Jubilee Year [2000]... marked by a return to the Sacrament of Penance, has given us an encouraging message... if many people and among them also many young people have benefited from approaching this Sacrament, it is probably necessary that pastors should arm themselves with confidence, creativity and perseverance in presenting it and leading people to appreciate it" [T. Prendergast S.J., "Repentance for the forgiveness of sins," Catholic Register, November 23, 2003, p. 10].

John Paul has urged bishops to make this a priority concern, appealing to them "...through them, to all priests... to undertake a vigorous revitalization of the sacrament of Reconciliation" [Ibid, p. 10].

Responding to this plea, Archbishop Thomas Collins of Edmonton has written a pastoral letter with the title, "Go in Peace." "Confession is good psychologically," he says. "In our secular society people value the opportunity to unburden themselves to a counselor of the dark secrets that weigh them down.... If we are to deal with the things that burden us, we need to articulate what they are, so that we are not caught up in a fog of anxiety. He also mentions that Confession connotes "acknowledging.... confessing God's greatness, as St. Augustine does in his Confessions, where he both honestly admits his sins and also at the same time proclaims and "confesses" the wonder and joy of God's grace and forgiveness" [ibid. p. 10].

Dear friends, there is nothing morbid about confessing our sins in the sacrament. Psychologically and spiritually, it is a great release, a freeing of the heart and mind. As we confess our sins we marvel at God's mercy and the assurance of his forgiveness. It is this assurance of God's forgiveness and his promise to help us in our time of need that makes this sacrament an occasion of great joy. If you haven't experienced this great sacrament in a long time, don't let this Advent go by without doing so.

Have a great Advent!

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