Second Sunday of Advent “A”.    December 9, 2007.  Our Lady of Grace 7:30, 11:30, 6PM.  Isaiah 11: 1-10.  Roman 15: 4-9.  Matthew 3:1-12.

A well known soccer star was involved in an accident in which a little girl was killed.  Even though it was an accident, he went to prison for negligent homicide. Because he was a deeply religious man, he certainly asked for God’s forgiveness.  He had paid his debt to society by spending time in prison.  The accident had cost him his soccer career.  He could do nothing to bring the little girl back to life. In moving on with his life, he didn’t believe that going to confession was all that God expected of him or all that he expected of himself. His own goodness made him want to demonstrate that he was sorry in a very concrete and visible way.   When a young woman at work became pregnant and both she and the man involved decided that abortion was the quick and easy answer to the unwanted pregnancy, the former soccer star stepped in to help the woman when she was abandoned by everyone, including her boy friend.  He became the woman’s protector and friend as she dealt with the fear of being left alone.  Most of all the former soccer star became the friend of the child in the woman’s womb.  His deep respect for this woman and his profound reverence for the gift of human life in her womb provided him with an opportunity to express his sorrow for his weakness and sin.  It is never enough to say that we are sorry for our sins and then walk away cleansed but unchanged.

I saw the movie Bella this week.  I am not going to tell you the rest of the story because it is worth seeing and I invite you to do so. The movie asks many questions about what it means to be a real man and about the values that bring lasting happiness.  The movie reminded me that unless our repentance changes our lives it is meaningless.

While John the Baptist was baptizing in preparation for the ministry of Jesus, many Pharisees and Sadducees, the religious elite of the Jewish people, came to John to be baptized along with the vast crowds that were moved by John’s preaching.   John the Baptist did not believe that the Pharisees and Sadducees were being honest.  He said to them, “You brood of snakes! Who warned you to flee from the coming wrath?  Produce good fruit as evidence of your repentance.”  The Sacrament of Reconciliation should be a part of our Advent preparation for Christmas, but confession is meaningless unless we give evidence that we have truly changed by the new way in which we live our lives.  While confessing our sins is very important, Jesus gave us the Sacraments of Baptism and Reconciliation so that we would be able to produce good works that show that we have truly repented.  True repentance demands a change in the way that we live.

The Pharisees and the Sadducees kept all the right rituals and obeyed the tiniest letter of the law. In some strange way their devotion to ritual and to law kept them isolated from life and riding high above others so that they never really experienced life deeply. They never understood the mind and heart of God.  We will be reading the Gospel of Matthew for most of the Sundays of the coming year.  Matthew’s Gospel will insist that God expects us to keep God’s law and the commandments.  At the same time, Jesus will say to us, “Go and learn the meaning of the praise, ‘I want mercy rather than sacrifice.’” (Matthew 12:17)  Law without mercy is not Christian.

While studying for the priesthood, William Wasson was diagnosed with a thyroid problem that the seminary thought would make it impossible for him to function as a priest.   He moved to Mexico to recover his health.  There the bishop decided to ordain William Wasson anyway.  When a teenager broke into the poor box in Church and the police were going to send the teen to jail, Fr. Wasson asked the judge to give him custody of the young man.  The priest took the boy home and soon eight more boys followed the first boy to live at Fr. Wassons’s house.  In the past 51 years Fr. Wasson and those who worked with him founded orphanages in nine countries.  When Fr. Wasson died last year at the age of 82 the orphanages he had founded had been home for over 15,000 children without parents and homes.  This past week I was privileged to visit the home Fr. Wasson started in Nicaragua.  I saw more than 300 abandoned and abused children being loved and cared for as a very concrete sign of our love for God.

As I watched these children without parents I found myself thinking about growing up in a home with a mother and father, good clothes and plenty to eat.  My parents were not perfect, but they were very good.  My family was not perfect, but it was very good.  I have always pretty much taken for granted all the advantages and opportunities I had as a child.  Often I was too busy to be grateful.  I was even too busy and involved with myself to be thoughtful.  When I graduated from high school I went to Canada for the summer with two of my friends.   I didn’t care much what my parents thought or whether they worried about me.  I certainly didn’t think about how much of themselves they had invested in me.   At this time of the year, whether our parents are gone as mine are, or whether they are still with us, we may well need to ask for forgiveness for our lack of gratitude and for the busyness that allowed us to move on the surface of life without touching the hearts of others and the heart of God.

Advent is a season of repentance and new beginnings. John the Baptist says to each of us, “produce good fruit – do good works – as evidence of your repentance.”  The child in the Bethlehem manger tugs at our hearts.  Wisdom teaches us that we need to express our sorrow, our change of heart and our gratitude in deeds of love.  True repentance and active charity always go together for those who follow Jesus.  For this Advent season of repentance and new beginnings we give God thanks and praise.