THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH

Her Doctrine and Morals

Second Sunday of Advent

10 December 2023

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The Sunday

Sermon

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Dear Friends,

Our journey through the Season of Advent brings us to a fundamental question. Who do we seek? Saint John the Baptist sent his disciples to ask Jesus if He was the One they were awaiting and seeking. After answering them and sending them back to Saint John, Jesus asks the people who they went out into the desert to see.

The people sought out Saint John because they were looking for a prophet. Jesus tells them that Saint John is more than a prophet. Saint John's disciples were seeking the Savior, but Jesus is more than this — He is God.

God never disappoints us. If we seek a prophet in Saint John, He gives us much more than a prophet. If we seek a Savior, God gives us much more. He gives us Himself. The opposite of this is true as well. If we strive to be free from God, He provides us with a place that is eternally devoid of Himself. It also lacks the peace and happiness that only come from Himself. This place of eternal separation from God and His gifts is Hell.

We have from God our free wills. This is a precious gift that we seldom genuinely appreciate. Because God loves us, He will not force us to love Him. We are free to choose who we seek and who we love. Too often, we seek only ourselves and the world. Selfishness and worldliness are, sadly, our most frequent and persistent goals.

Jesus showed Saint John's disciples the clear signs of Who He was. Jesus instructed the people clearly who Saint John was. For us, Jesus often shows us clear signs of who we are seeking or what direction we are going. When we genuinely seek God, we follow Jesus. We strive to practice daily mortifications of self-denial and embrace our crosses willingly. As bitter as this often seems, God gives us grace, and the cross becomes light, sweet, and joyful. This is how Jesus reveals Himself to us. In seeking Jesus, He shows us Himself even though He is hidden in humility, poverty, suffering, etc.

We are often deceived or led astray in our pursuits. God usually allows this as a test of our true love or desire. What/Who do we truly want? Will we be satisfied with compromises, imitations, or fakes? Or will we keep looking until we find Him? There is almost always a cross; we must look beyond worldly pleasure and grandeur. To see God we must look in humility, poverty, obedience, simplicity, etc. When we begin this pursuit, God gradually reveals Himself to us by giving us spiritual peace and consolation. Seldom, if ever, does He shower us with worldly materialism in our pursuit of Him.

When we seek self-indulgence, God grants us this and even more. The pursuit of bodily pleasure usually finds no reasonable bounds. Overindulgence is generally what is found, and this overabundance of physical pleasure and stimulation almost always ends in pain and suffering. God gives us a foretaste of Hell as He shows us what we are genuinely seeking. Physical pleasure is temporary and leads to eternal misery.

Saint Augustine reveals this to us in his Confessions. He pursued all the worldly pleasures and appetites, and every one ended in emptiness, frustration, pain, and even disgust. Our hearts constantly search for happiness, and God clearly shows us that true happiness is not to be found in material, temporal pleasure, or self-indulgence. We find true joy and happiness when we willingly forego these temporary pleasures and even embrace our crosses and sufferings. This spiritual happiness shows us what awaits us in eternity. It is our motivation to become even more diligent in humbly embracing the cross and self-denial. The practice of the virtues becomes increasingly sweet as we draw nearer to dying to our misaligned self-will so that we can eternally embrace and live in God's Will.

If we genuinely want to find Jesus this Christmas Season, we must forego looking for worldly happiness and pleasure as if this were our goal. On Christmas Day, if we are blessed to find Him, He will be hidden from the eyes of most of the world in a humble, poor, and cold manger. The world will miss Him and be unable to recognize Him because the world seeks only materialism and temporary physical pleasure. As it flees from meekness, humility, poverty, suffering, and crosses, it unknowingly flees from Jesus, God, salvation, and eternal happiness.

Those who are truly wise in the ways of God rather than in the world's ways will hear Jesus in daily self-denial and the carrying of their crosses. Forgetting themselves, they will see Him in humility, poverty, and lowliness. The world will never understand the happiness in this because the world will never taste and see how sweet the yoke of the Lord is. May we truly embrace the penance of self-denial and the cross this Advent Season so that we can find Him on Christmas.

May the Immaculate Heart of Mary inspire, guide, and protect us!