Hi everyone, and welcome to Weekly Homilies with Father Mark Suslenko, Pastor of SS. Isidore and Maria Parish in Glastonbury, Connecticut. We are part of the Catholic Archdiocese of Hartford. I'm Carol Vassar, parish director of communications, and this is Episode 1 of Season 6 for the first Sunday of Advent: Nov. 27, 2022. Our Gospel reading is from Matthew, Chapter 24, verses 37-44
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."
The Gospel of the Lord
“Make Friends with Your Soul” by Father Mark S. Suslenko, Pastor, SS. Isidore and Maria Parish, Glastonbury, Connecticut
I'm not sure that we really appreciate or understand how much we really need this very short and beautiful season of Advent. How important it is to understanding who we are and where we're going. You know, as we look at life as it plays out for us every day, the one thing that we know is that we can be very consumed by it. It captivates us. Sometimes holds us hostage. We become tethered to the things we have to do, what we consider important, what others expect of us. We become embroiled in the particulars of our existence, of negotiating the various parts as they play out. We can become very tired. We can easily become very overwhelmed. We can become even exhausted trying to keep all of the pieces together and in play.
The other thing that the busyness of our lives does to us is it can easily cause us to become oblivious to the bigger realities that surround us, the more important elements of what it means to be a human being, especially a child of God. The things of this world can really lead us away from our true selves and not closer to it. And so Advent is this very gentle, very joyful time when we can put the brakes on a bit and begin to ponder things more deeply, to savor the moments of life more completely and find ourselves on the path to greater truth, understanding who we are and where we're going.
You know, there's a very simple prayer; we're all very familiar with it. We've all learned it. It's called the Lord's Prayer, the Our Father. I'm sure all of us say it at least daily, once, if not multiple times. And as we recite those very simple, poignant words, we begin to realize that it really is the perfect prayer because it encapsulates our faith so completely and so simply as Jesus articulated it for us.
But as we recite those words, there are two lines in that prayer that I'm not sure we truly understand completely because if we did, they would cause us to bristle a bit or at least to step back and take notice and wonder whether we really mean what we are saying.
The first is this: thy kingdom come. The second: thy will be done. Both of those very simple, direct sentences have a power to them that sometimes escapes our notice.
St. Cyprian, who is a third-century martyr, a truly remarkable man for his courage, his ability to cling to the faith and endure great suffering. Some of his writings have been preserved through history, and he has some things to say about God's kingdom and God's will. In terms of God's kingdom, he says, do we really desire what we say when we ask for that kingdom to come? Because sometimes it appears that we're more pleased with this world and the things that it offers rather than truly hastening and being eager for that eternal kingdom to come. Do we realize that when we say those words, thy kingdom come, that we're asking for this to go away and for God's reign to come completely upon us? That this will evolve into what God ultimately intends it to be: all this fading away. Do we really realize when we say those simple words that this is what we are expressing a longing for: the kingdom of God?
But yet, as we look at the way we order ourselves and we put things together, it would appear that we're more comfortable just staying here at times, of preserving what we have rather than leaving and going somewhere else.
Thy kingdom come.
Thy will be done. Thy will be done. Ultimately, God's will is that we die to ourselves so that we can find life again. The very act of love requires that of us. If we truly love someone, we have to die to our own agenda, our own self, so that we can truly be available for the person that I love. And ultimately, we are called, when we close our eyes in death, to die to our true eternal self. But Jesus reminds us very often that the Christians must die to themselves, so it is God's will that we put ourselves aside so that we can find life again. And he said that the Christian has an obligation to do God's will, and he says it's unreasonable to think that we would ask for God's will to be done when what we're really trying to accomplish is our own. That we're really more interested in doing what we want to do rather than what God is asking of us. That the agenda of our lives is really more important, and so the prayer really turns into "Can I convince you that my will is better than your will? That what I want is what I want you to want from me? And that's not how it works.
And so Advent gives us this time to kind of refocus a bit and ask ourselves, who are we really? What is the purpose of our life? It's not here. It's a bigger journey, a bigger picture, a different dimension, a greater reality. Whose kingdom do we serve? Is it the kingdom of this world? Because if we really look at it, and we look at the Gospel and the way Jesus talks about things, and we listen to the readings during Advent, we get a really different picture of what God's kingdom is all about. That's a kingdom of peace, of justice. Where everything kind of fits together and everybody has a place. Where we don't resolve conflicts with violence. We don't take up the arms of war. We are not aggressive toward one another, and we don't leave people behind and neglect them. God's kingdom is a kingdom where there's harmony, and there's bliss, where all is one and it comes together. But yet, we look at the way our world is structured, and we certainly don't see that kingdom here. It's no wonder there's a conflict between Christian and world. There's supposed to be because they're two different realities when you really look at it. And that's why Saint Cyprian says the world hates Christians, and it does in a very real. So why would you love something that doesn't really want you when you really ought to be loving Jesus Christ, who is the only one who can really save and redeem you? Because when it's time for us to leave this world, whenever that happens, it's not the world that's gonna save us at that point. It's not gonna be anything we've accumulated here that is going to bring us anywhere. It's only the love of Jesus Christ and the redemption in salvation that he offers us.
So, in short, Advent is a time for us to pause, to stop, to reflect, open our eyes, open our hearts, and make friends with our souls. Because in the busyness of life, it's our soul that gets neglected first. Because everything else vies for our attention. Make friends with our soul so that we can understand more deeply what kingdom we serve and whose will we desire.
Father Mark Suslenko is the pastor of SS. Isidore and Maria Parish in Glastonbury, Connecticut. Learn more about our parish community at www.isidoreandmaria.org. And follow us on social media: Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Our music comes free of charge from Blue Dot Sessions in Fall River, Massachusetts. I’m Carol Vassar. Thanks for joining us.