Deacon Mike Meyer / Sunday, November 28, 2021 / Categories: Homilies The Most Important Candle Homily for the First Sunday in Advent, Year C 2021 The Meyer family uses a lot of candles, especially in December. You see, my wife, Jessica, is Jewish, so we celebrate Hanukkah with her. Hanukkah candles are left to burn down each day, so after replacing the center candle and the candles representing each day, we use 44 candles by the eighth day of Hanukkah. No wonder they call it the Festival of Lights. We’re not done yet, though. A certain Meyer has a birthday in December, so if the homeowners insurance is paid on time, there’ll be another 56 candles topping a birthday cake to add into the mix. But wait, we still have more. It’s Advent, so that’s 4 more candles for our Advent wreath, one for each week leading up to Christmas. For those who are counting, that’s 104 candles so far, and if you throw in those awful Yankee Candles that promise to smell like something we really like but end up making our eyes water, the Meyers have something like a gazillion candles in the house, and that’s just in December. Candles are important in the Meyer home, but they’re important here in Church, too. We see seven right here in the sanctuary, each symbolizing God’s real presence among us—two at the altar, where Jesus becomes really present among us in the Eucharist; one at the Tabernacle, where Jesus remains with us; and four more on our Advent wreath, representing Christ’s coming both at Christmas and at the end of time. Again, that’s a lot of candles! Believe it or not, there’s another type of candle here that I haven’t mentioned, more numerous than all of these combined, and it’s not those votives in the back of the Church. It’s the most important candle we have as Christians. Let’s see if we can figure out what it is. All three of our readings reflect the theme the Church has chosen for the First Sunday of Advent—Jesus’ second coming in glory at the end of time. Our first reading from Jeremiah recalls God’s promise to send a Messiah so we can all live in God’s eternal peace. Saint Paul, in our second reading, teaches the Thessalonians how to live good Christian lives so they’re ready to meet Jesus when he returns. And in our Gospel, Jesus warns his followers to be prepared, ready to stand upright with their heads raised high on the day of redemption. Now, some of the signs and wonders that will precede the Second Coming sound pretty frightening, but Jesus and Saint Paul assure us that it will only be scary for the people who don’t follow Jesus. Jesus’ followers have nothing to fear because if we follow Jesus, we will be saved. The message from these readings, then, is twofold: we need to be vigilant, always prepared for that unknown time when Jesus will return; and we need to be holy and blameless in his sight when he does return. How do we do that? Our readings offer us three ways. First, to quote Al Rotella, my high school’s football coach, “You gotta wanna.” We have to want to give ourselves over to God and follow God’s ways. That’s exactly what we prayed for in our Responsorial Psalm when we sang, “To you, O Lord, I lift up my soul.” We need to draw closer to God by nurturing our spiritual lives, committing ourselves to prayer, and controlling our behavior. We have to live the way Jesus lived, the way he taught us to live through his perfect example. Second, we need to be humble. We turn to our Psalmist again who tells us that the Lord “guides the humble to justice and teaches the humble his way.” We have to accept that in our relationship with God, we’re just creatures, and God, only God, is our Creator. God’s the boss; we’re not. God’s in control; we’re not. We need to listen to God, which takes humility. Humility also involves acknowledging our faults, confessing our sins before God, and making amends for them. If we want to stand before Christ at the end of time with our heads held high, we need to be humble now. Finally, we need to love. We just heard Saint Paul praying for the Thessalonians to “increase and abound in love for one another and for all.” We heard Jesus say just that at Mass only a few weeks ago—love God and love our neighbor, right? When we love, we follow Jesus. There’s no better way to prepare ourselves to meet him face to face at the end of time. Desire, humility, and love, that’s how we prepare ourselves for Christ’s Second Coming, and there’s no shortage of opportunities to practice all of these things right now as we kick off the Advent season. We can kindle our desire to be close to God by actively participating at Mass, coming to our Advent Retreat on December 19, and taking advantage of the FORMED educational library that’s now available to all parishioners. We can fan the flames of our humility by repairing broken relationships and confessing our sins at our Advent Penance Service, also on December 19. We can set our hearts ablaze with the love of Christ by participating in our holiday giving tree, by donating food, clothes, household items, and toys, or by volunteering to support the 50 people left homeless by the apartment complex fire in Flemington last week. All of these opportunities make clear that Jesus needs us to carry his light to the darkest places of the earth. And that brings us back to the most important candle we have as Christians. At Baptism, each one of us received the light of Christ on a candle just like this. We were told to keep it burning brightly so that “enlightened by Christ, [we] may walk always as a child of the light and, persevering in faith, may run to meet the Lord when he comes with all the Saints in the heavenly court.” No, our baptismal candle isn’t the most important candle either. We are. The best way to prepare for Jesus’ coming at Christmas and at the end of time is to carry the light of Christ wherever it needs to go. If everyone of us commits to keeping the light of Christ always burning brightly within us, Jesus will have even more candles than you’ll find at the Meyer’s house in December, and the world will be a much brighter place. Readings: Jeremiah 33:14-16; Psalm 25; 1 Thessalonians 3:12-4:2; Luke 21:25-28, 34-36 The Walls of a Playground A Holy Family Print 623 Please login or register to post comments.