December 2, 2007: First Sunday of Advent
Isaiah 2:1-5 Romans 13:11-14 Matthew 24:37-44
To the church in the diaspora[1]
& to the church of the unchurched[2]
First reading
This is what Isaiah, son of Amoz, saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem. In days to come, the mountain of the Lord’s house shall be established as the highest mountain and raised above the hills. All nations shall stream toward it; many peoples shall come and say: “Come, let us climb the Lord’s mountain, to the house of the God of Jacob, that he may instruct us in his ways, and we may walk in his paths.” For from Zion shall go forth instruction and the word of the LORD from Jerusalem. He shall judge between the nations, and impose terms on many peoples. 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. O house of Jacob, come, let us walk in the light of the Lord (Is 2:1-5)!
Gospel
Alleluia, alleluia.
A reading from the holy Gospel according to Matthew.
Glory to you, Lord.
Jesus said to his disciples: “As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be at the coming of the Son of Man. In those days before the flood, they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, up to the day that Noah entered the ark. They did not know until the flood came and carried them all away. So will it be also at the coming of the Son of Man. Two men will be out in the field; one will be taken, and one will be left. Two women will be grinding at the mill; one will be taken, and one will be left. Therefore, stay awake! For you do not know on which day your Lord will come. Be sure of this: if the master of the house had known the hour of night when the thief was coming, he would have stayed awake and not let his house be broken into. So too, you also must be prepared, for at an hour you do not expect, the Son of Man will come” (Mt 24:37-44).
The Gospel of the Lord.
Praise to you, Lord Jesus Christ.
Introduction
Dark December Days
Today we exit Ordinary Time and enter into the Extraordinary Time of Advent in preparation for Christmas 2007. Today is New Years Day in the church. Today we go from liturgical cycle C to cycle A for the Sunday gospel readings. This past church year the gospel readings were from St. Luke. This new church year (cycle A) the readings will be from St. Matthew. Today we also exchange the liturgical color of Ordinary Time (green) for purple -- the color for penance. That is a leftover from pre-Vatican II days when Advent, like Lent, was a strictly penitential season. In those days, Advent frowned on any partying, gift giving and decorating before December 24. After Vatican II, Advent now is a season of joyful expectation instead of penance. In a few places during Advent, some liturgists choose to exchange purple vestments for blue ones in honor of mother Mary and baby boy Jesus.
It is December 2 today. In this hemisphere, winter begins on the 21st with the shortest day of the year offering us only nine short hours of light and fifteen long hours of darkness. The physical darkness of these days magnifies all our aches and pains, and all our worries and fears. These automatically diminish in size on a bright summer day. The physical darkness of these days is intensified by the current high price of gas and health care, and by the never-ending presidential debates in which candidates tear each down and make promises we have heard before. The darkness is intensified also by the casualty count of a never-ending war in Iraq and by the relentless terrorism which robs our lives 24/7 of any sense of normalcy.
No wonder then that both the Jewish and Christian communities light up their lamps with a vengeance these days to dispel the physical darkness of December and the spiritual darkness of the times.
Lamp lighting time for Jews
Soon the Jewish community will light up the lamps of Hanukkah. Known also as the Festival of Lights, Hanukkah is an eight-day celebration beginning on the 25th day of Kislev according to the Hebrew calendar. Hanukkah can fall anytime between late November and late December. This year (2007) the first day off Hanukkah lands on the 5th of December.
In Hebrew Hanukkah simply means rededication. The feast commemorates the purification of the temple in Jerusalem and its rededication after the Greek tyrant Antiochus Epiphanes desecrated it in 161 B.C. On the site of the altar of holocausts he had built a pagan altar and offered a pagan sacrifice to the Greek god Zeus Olympios. The prophet Daniel and St. Matthew refer to this profanation as "the horrible abomination standing in the holy place” (Dn 9:27; Mt 24:15). Three years later, Judas Maccabeus purified the sanctuary, erected a new altar, and undertook to rededicate the temple.
This time of the rolling year is for telling stories. According to a story told and retold in the Jewish community no consecrated olive oil could be found to keep the temple menorah burning through the eight days of rededication. The temple menorah is the seven branch candelabra prescribed by Moses as temple furniture (Exodus 25:31-40). [3] After diligently scouring the temple, Judas Maccabeus finally found a small jug of oil still with the high priest's seal intact, and therefore not contaminated by the enemy. But there wasn’t enough oil in the jug to last through the eight days of rededication.
Then a miracle happened! God caused the little amount of oil in the jug to continue supplying fuel for the temple menorah throughout the long rite of rededication. In gratitude, Judas Maccabeus, his brothers and all people of Israel decided that the rededication of the temple should be commemorated yearly for eight days with joy and thanksgiving (I Mc 4:59; II Mc 10:5) St. John refers to it when he writes, “The time came to celebrate the Feast of Dedication in Jerusalem, and it was winter” (Jn 10:22).
On December 5th this year, the Jewish community will light the first of the eight candles of the Hanukkah menorah. As they are lighted one by one they dispel the physical darkness of December and the spiritual darkness of our times.
Hanukkah gone astray
Johannes Buxtorf II (1599-1664), a Protestant Christian Hebrew scholar, often criticized the way the Jewish community celebrated their feast days. Writing of Hanukkah he described how they strayed far from the feast’s original inspiration and overlaid it with superstition and pettiness. He writes,
They celebrate Hanukkah more by eating, drinking and having fun than by giving thanks to God for their victory over the enemy. They prepare a seven-branch menorah and then light one light each day until the eighth night. The lights are not allowed to burn all night long. While they are burning no one is allowed to do any work in the house. The menorah itself must stand on the right side of the door, not less than ten paces from the ground, and not higher than twenty. The Jews often hold subtle and futile discussions on how long the lights should burn, who should light them, whether or not it is permitted to light one light with the other, and similar things.
Buxtorf finishes off his criticism saying that in their observance of Hanukkah (their Festival of Lights) “They are very fussy about the outer light but are not concerned about the great darkness which abides in their hearts” (Synagoga Judaica by Johannes Buxtorf II).
Lamp lighting time for Christians
Today, December 2, is lamp lighting time for Christians. The Christian community will light the first of four candles on the Advent wreath. Each candle represents one of the four weeks of preparation for the birthday of the Lord. As the candles are lighted, one each week, they dispel the physical darkness of December and the spiritual darkness of our times. Then on Christmas Day, He is born who is the bright Sun of Justice (Mal 4:2) and the Light who enlightens everyone coming into this world (Jn 1:9).
Christmas gone astray
Buxtorf, who berated the Jews for the way they celebrated Hanukkah, would probably berate us for the way we celebrate Christmas. He would probably charge us with having strayed far from the feast’s original inspiration -- “an infant wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in a manger” (Lk 2:12). He would probably charge us with celebrating Christmas more by eating, drinking and having fun than by giving thanks to God because a Savior has been born to us, who is Christ the Lord (Lk 2:11). He would probably berate us for turning the Christmas season into an orgy of joy which places a heavy expectation upon all to be merry. That, he would tell us, is an impossible expectation for those who are out of work and can’t buy the joys of Christmas, or for those who have lost a partner of 40, 50 years or a loved one in the battle for Iraq.
Buxtorf would probably berate us also for turning the season into an orgy of busyness with parties we have to host or go to, with cards we have to write, with gifts we have to shop for and with visits we have to make. Berating us for all the decorations we hang and all the lamps we light, he would probably characterize us as he did his contemporary Jews: “They are very fussy about the outer light but are not concerned about the great darkness which abides in their hearts.”
A Jew who saved Christmas
This time of the rolling year is for telling stories. Here is a story about a Jew who was filled with a great inner light which marvelously enhanced the glow of his fully lit menorah on the last day of Hanukkah. This is the story of a Jew who dispelled the terrible darkness of a cold winter night and saved Christmas for countless people.
On the night of December 11, 1995 (six days before the beginning of Hanukkah on the 17th that year), a surprise party was being held for the seventieth birthday of Aaron Feuerstein, CEO and owner of Malden Mills in Methuen, Massachusetts. Feuerstein is also a devout Jew who reads Shakespeare and the Talmud (a rich treasury of rabbinical tradition). During the party a boiler exploded and a devastating fire broke out and demolished a good part of his factory.
Many thought for sure that CEO Feuerstein would grab the insurance money and run. He didn't. The morning after the fire, he issued this statement: "With God's help, we will overcome the events of the past 12 hours and continue to be a force in New England." Then this Jewish CEO gave all his 2400 employees their paycheck, a $275 Christmas bonus and a $20 coupon for food. Three days later, on Dec. 14, more than 1000 employees gathered in the gym of the Catholic High School to learn the fate of their jobs. Aaron entered the gym from the back, shook the snow off his coat and headed for the podium. All heads turned; the crowd rose to its feet, and the cheering rose to a roar. Feuerstein addressed them with these words,
I will get right to my announcement. For the next 30 days--and it might be more--but at least for the next 30 days, all our employees will be paid their full salaries. I think you already have been advised that your health insurance has been paid for the next 90 days. But over and above the money, the most important thing Malden Mills can do for our workers is to get you back to work. By January 2, 1996, we will restart operations, and within 90 days, God willing, we will be 100 percent operational.
There was a moment of stunned disbelief, and then the workers rose to their feet again, cheering and hugging each other and also weeping. A miracle had just happened! It was many times greater than the physical miracle which multiplied the oil to keep the temple menorah burning through the days of rededication. This was a spiritual and moral miracle: a devout Jew and CEO had multiplied bread for his 2400 employees and had saved Christmas for them!
Time magazine for January 8, 1996, reported that Feuerstein was true to his word; he continued to pay his employees in full, at a cost of one and a half million dollars a week and at an average wage of twelve and a half dollars an hour. Later that same year, corporate and capitalist America, stunned by such fiscal insanity and half-hearted capitalism, named him CEO of the Year.
Conclusion
Menorahs and wreaths aglow with an inner light
Back in 1995 Hanukkah began at sundown on December 17 -- the day the Novena of Christmas begins for Catholics. Three days after Aaron’s stunning announcement to his workers on December 14, Aaron lit the first candle of his menorah. When after eight days all were lit, his menorah was luminously aglow especially with the bright light that abode in his heart. There is an Ite to every Mass. Go the Mass is ended! Go and light the four candles of Advent, and let their luminous glow be a reflection of the bright light that abides in our hearts.
[1] Diaspora is a Greek word meaning dispersion. Originally it referred to the settling of scattered colonies of Jews outside Palestine after the Babylonian exile. It’s now come to mean the migration or scattering of a people away from an established or ancestral homeland or parish!
[2] By the “the unchurched” is especially meant not those who have left the church but those whom the church has left!
[3] While the temple menorah has seven candles, the Hanukkah menorah has nine. It has eight side branch candles for the eight days of Rededication. Then it has a central branch candle called the Shamash. The Jews added this central candle for profane purposes like lighting other lamps throughout the house or lighting the fire in the hearth. Israeli Jews call the nine-branch menorah a hanukkiah.
Isaiah 2:1-5 Romans 13:11-14 Matthew 24:37-44
To the church in the diaspora[1]
& to the church of the unchurched[2]
First reading
This is what Isaiah, son of Amoz, saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem. In days to come, the mountain of the Lord’s house shall be established as the highest mountain and raised above the hills. All nations shall stream toward it; many peoples shall come and say: “Come, let us climb the Lord’s mountain, to the house of the God of Jacob, that he may instruct us in his ways, and we may walk in his paths.” For from Zion shall go forth instruction and the word of the LORD from Jerusalem. He shall judge between the nations, and impose terms on many peoples. 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. O house of Jacob, come, let us walk in the light of the Lord (Is 2:1-5)!
Gospel
Alleluia, alleluia.
A reading from the holy Gospel according to Matthew.
Glory to you, Lord.
Jesus said to his disciples: “As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be at the coming of the Son of Man. In those days before the flood, they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, up to the day that Noah entered the ark. They did not know until the flood came and carried them all away. So will it be also at the coming of the Son of Man. Two men will be out in the field; one will be taken, and one will be left. Two women will be grinding at the mill; one will be taken, and one will be left. Therefore, stay awake! For you do not know on which day your Lord will come. Be sure of this: if the master of the house had known the hour of night when the thief was coming, he would have stayed awake and not let his house be broken into. So too, you also must be prepared, for at an hour you do not expect, the Son of Man will come” (Mt 24:37-44).
The Gospel of the Lord.
Praise to you, Lord Jesus Christ.
Introduction
Dark December Days
Today we exit Ordinary Time and enter into the Extraordinary Time of Advent in preparation for Christmas 2007. Today is New Years Day in the church. Today we go from liturgical cycle C to cycle A for the Sunday gospel readings. This past church year the gospel readings were from St. Luke. This new church year (cycle A) the readings will be from St. Matthew. Today we also exchange the liturgical color of Ordinary Time (green) for purple -- the color for penance. That is a leftover from pre-Vatican II days when Advent, like Lent, was a strictly penitential season. In those days, Advent frowned on any partying, gift giving and decorating before December 24. After Vatican II, Advent now is a season of joyful expectation instead of penance. In a few places during Advent, some liturgists choose to exchange purple vestments for blue ones in honor of mother Mary and baby boy Jesus.
It is December 2 today. In this hemisphere, winter begins on the 21st with the shortest day of the year offering us only nine short hours of light and fifteen long hours of darkness. The physical darkness of these days magnifies all our aches and pains, and all our worries and fears. These automatically diminish in size on a bright summer day. The physical darkness of these days is intensified by the current high price of gas and health care, and by the never-ending presidential debates in which candidates tear each down and make promises we have heard before. The darkness is intensified also by the casualty count of a never-ending war in Iraq and by the relentless terrorism which robs our lives 24/7 of any sense of normalcy.
No wonder then that both the Jewish and Christian communities light up their lamps with a vengeance these days to dispel the physical darkness of December and the spiritual darkness of the times.
Lamp lighting time for Jews
Soon the Jewish community will light up the lamps of Hanukkah. Known also as the Festival of Lights, Hanukkah is an eight-day celebration beginning on the 25th day of Kislev according to the Hebrew calendar. Hanukkah can fall anytime between late November and late December. This year (2007) the first day off Hanukkah lands on the 5th of December.
In Hebrew Hanukkah simply means rededication. The feast commemorates the purification of the temple in Jerusalem and its rededication after the Greek tyrant Antiochus Epiphanes desecrated it in 161 B.C. On the site of the altar of holocausts he had built a pagan altar and offered a pagan sacrifice to the Greek god Zeus Olympios. The prophet Daniel and St. Matthew refer to this profanation as "the horrible abomination standing in the holy place” (Dn 9:27; Mt 24:15). Three years later, Judas Maccabeus purified the sanctuary, erected a new altar, and undertook to rededicate the temple.
This time of the rolling year is for telling stories. According to a story told and retold in the Jewish community no consecrated olive oil could be found to keep the temple menorah burning through the eight days of rededication. The temple menorah is the seven branch candelabra prescribed by Moses as temple furniture (Exodus 25:31-40). [3] After diligently scouring the temple, Judas Maccabeus finally found a small jug of oil still with the high priest's seal intact, and therefore not contaminated by the enemy. But there wasn’t enough oil in the jug to last through the eight days of rededication.
Then a miracle happened! God caused the little amount of oil in the jug to continue supplying fuel for the temple menorah throughout the long rite of rededication. In gratitude, Judas Maccabeus, his brothers and all people of Israel decided that the rededication of the temple should be commemorated yearly for eight days with joy and thanksgiving (I Mc 4:59; II Mc 10:5) St. John refers to it when he writes, “The time came to celebrate the Feast of Dedication in Jerusalem, and it was winter” (Jn 10:22).
On December 5th this year, the Jewish community will light the first of the eight candles of the Hanukkah menorah. As they are lighted one by one they dispel the physical darkness of December and the spiritual darkness of our times.
Hanukkah gone astray
Johannes Buxtorf II (1599-1664), a Protestant Christian Hebrew scholar, often criticized the way the Jewish community celebrated their feast days. Writing of Hanukkah he described how they strayed far from the feast’s original inspiration and overlaid it with superstition and pettiness. He writes,
They celebrate Hanukkah more by eating, drinking and having fun than by giving thanks to God for their victory over the enemy. They prepare a seven-branch menorah and then light one light each day until the eighth night. The lights are not allowed to burn all night long. While they are burning no one is allowed to do any work in the house. The menorah itself must stand on the right side of the door, not less than ten paces from the ground, and not higher than twenty. The Jews often hold subtle and futile discussions on how long the lights should burn, who should light them, whether or not it is permitted to light one light with the other, and similar things.
Buxtorf finishes off his criticism saying that in their observance of Hanukkah (their Festival of Lights) “They are very fussy about the outer light but are not concerned about the great darkness which abides in their hearts” (Synagoga Judaica by Johannes Buxtorf II).
Lamp lighting time for Christians
Today, December 2, is lamp lighting time for Christians. The Christian community will light the first of four candles on the Advent wreath. Each candle represents one of the four weeks of preparation for the birthday of the Lord. As the candles are lighted, one each week, they dispel the physical darkness of December and the spiritual darkness of our times. Then on Christmas Day, He is born who is the bright Sun of Justice (Mal 4:2) and the Light who enlightens everyone coming into this world (Jn 1:9).
Christmas gone astray
Buxtorf, who berated the Jews for the way they celebrated Hanukkah, would probably berate us for the way we celebrate Christmas. He would probably charge us with having strayed far from the feast’s original inspiration -- “an infant wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in a manger” (Lk 2:12). He would probably charge us with celebrating Christmas more by eating, drinking and having fun than by giving thanks to God because a Savior has been born to us, who is Christ the Lord (Lk 2:11). He would probably berate us for turning the Christmas season into an orgy of joy which places a heavy expectation upon all to be merry. That, he would tell us, is an impossible expectation for those who are out of work and can’t buy the joys of Christmas, or for those who have lost a partner of 40, 50 years or a loved one in the battle for Iraq.
Buxtorf would probably berate us also for turning the season into an orgy of busyness with parties we have to host or go to, with cards we have to write, with gifts we have to shop for and with visits we have to make. Berating us for all the decorations we hang and all the lamps we light, he would probably characterize us as he did his contemporary Jews: “They are very fussy about the outer light but are not concerned about the great darkness which abides in their hearts.”
A Jew who saved Christmas
This time of the rolling year is for telling stories. Here is a story about a Jew who was filled with a great inner light which marvelously enhanced the glow of his fully lit menorah on the last day of Hanukkah. This is the story of a Jew who dispelled the terrible darkness of a cold winter night and saved Christmas for countless people.
On the night of December 11, 1995 (six days before the beginning of Hanukkah on the 17th that year), a surprise party was being held for the seventieth birthday of Aaron Feuerstein, CEO and owner of Malden Mills in Methuen, Massachusetts. Feuerstein is also a devout Jew who reads Shakespeare and the Talmud (a rich treasury of rabbinical tradition). During the party a boiler exploded and a devastating fire broke out and demolished a good part of his factory.
Many thought for sure that CEO Feuerstein would grab the insurance money and run. He didn't. The morning after the fire, he issued this statement: "With God's help, we will overcome the events of the past 12 hours and continue to be a force in New England." Then this Jewish CEO gave all his 2400 employees their paycheck, a $275 Christmas bonus and a $20 coupon for food. Three days later, on Dec. 14, more than 1000 employees gathered in the gym of the Catholic High School to learn the fate of their jobs. Aaron entered the gym from the back, shook the snow off his coat and headed for the podium. All heads turned; the crowd rose to its feet, and the cheering rose to a roar. Feuerstein addressed them with these words,
I will get right to my announcement. For the next 30 days--and it might be more--but at least for the next 30 days, all our employees will be paid their full salaries. I think you already have been advised that your health insurance has been paid for the next 90 days. But over and above the money, the most important thing Malden Mills can do for our workers is to get you back to work. By January 2, 1996, we will restart operations, and within 90 days, God willing, we will be 100 percent operational.
There was a moment of stunned disbelief, and then the workers rose to their feet again, cheering and hugging each other and also weeping. A miracle had just happened! It was many times greater than the physical miracle which multiplied the oil to keep the temple menorah burning through the days of rededication. This was a spiritual and moral miracle: a devout Jew and CEO had multiplied bread for his 2400 employees and had saved Christmas for them!
Time magazine for January 8, 1996, reported that Feuerstein was true to his word; he continued to pay his employees in full, at a cost of one and a half million dollars a week and at an average wage of twelve and a half dollars an hour. Later that same year, corporate and capitalist America, stunned by such fiscal insanity and half-hearted capitalism, named him CEO of the Year.
Conclusion
Menorahs and wreaths aglow with an inner light
Back in 1995 Hanukkah began at sundown on December 17 -- the day the Novena of Christmas begins for Catholics. Three days after Aaron’s stunning announcement to his workers on December 14, Aaron lit the first candle of his menorah. When after eight days all were lit, his menorah was luminously aglow especially with the bright light that abode in his heart. There is an Ite to every Mass. Go the Mass is ended! Go and light the four candles of Advent, and let their luminous glow be a reflection of the bright light that abides in our hearts.
[1] Diaspora is a Greek word meaning dispersion. Originally it referred to the settling of scattered colonies of Jews outside Palestine after the Babylonian exile. It’s now come to mean the migration or scattering of a people away from an established or ancestral homeland or parish!
[2] By the “the unchurched” is especially meant not those who have left the church but those whom the church has left!
[3] While the temple menorah has seven candles, the Hanukkah menorah has nine. It has eight side branch candles for the eight days of Rededication. Then it has a central branch candle called the Shamash. The Jews added this central candle for profane purposes like lighting other lamps throughout the house or lighting the fire in the hearth. Israeli Jews call the nine-branch menorah a hanukkiah.
