Shout for joy! Sing joyfully!1 “Rejoice in the Lord always. I shall say it again: rejoice!”2 Today, the Third Sunday of Advent, is known as Gaudete Sunday. As you might’ve guessed, Gaudete in Latin means “rejoice”. It’s the Sunday we light the pink candle.
On this Sunday the season of Advent takes something of a turn. During the first two weeks of Advent, as an extension of the Feast of Christ the King, which we celebrate the last Sunday of each liturgical year, the liturgy focuses intently on Christ’s glorious return. Hence, the singular message of the first half of Advent is simply “Repent!”
Finding its meaning in the Greek word metanoia, repentance means to have a change of mind and heart, to change from within. Another word for “change” is convert. The start of Advent calls us to live each day, each minute, in anticipation and expectation, not growing tired, complacent, or losing hope. Because Christians are to live life with meaning and purpose, we are to be sober, vigilant, awake, alert. Above all, as Saint Paul indicates, we are to be joyful. Friedrich Nietzsche once quipped: “I might believe in the Redeemer if his followers looked more redeemed.”
In its Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World (Gaudium et spes, meaning “Joy and hope”), the Second Vatican Council teaches: “the Church has always had the duty of scrutinizing the signs of the times and of interpreting them in the light of the Gospel.”3 The Church is not merely the hierarchy (i.e., the Pope and the bishops) but all the faithful.
The Spirit leads us ever forward to the coming of Christ, to the full realization of God's reign, and not backwards to an imagined time when, in the words of Pope Saint John XXIII, “everything was a full triumph for the Christian idea...”4 Historian that he was, he went on to point out that there never was such a time. So, with Good Pope John, we too, “must disagree with those prophets of gloom, who are always forecasting disaster as though the end of the world were at hand.”5 Hope, the flower of faith, not despair, is what enables us to rejoice always. Joy is the nectar of the flower of hope.
Why does Saint Paul exhort the Christians of ancient Philippi to rejoice? Because “The Lord is near.”6 It is important during Advent to note that “Advent” means coming. We begin this season by being reminded of what we frequently recite in the Creed: “he will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead.”7 Then, at Christmas we celebrate the Son of God’s coming into the world through the Virgin Mary, that moment when eternity stepped into time.
But it is also important not only to know about but to experience the reality of Christ’s presence in the here and now. He is present in a variety of ways. As the priest-poet Gerard Manley Hopkins so beautifully observed:
for Christ plays in ten thousand places,Most powerfully, he is really present whenever and wherever the Church celebrates the Eucharist. Christ’s real presence in the Eucharistic liturgy is fourfold: he is present in the gathering of the baptized, in the person of the priest, in proclamation of the scriptures, and in the consecrated bread and wine.
Lovely in limbs, and lovely in eyes not his
To the Father through the features of men's faces8
Rejoice! The Lord is not only near but here, now! By your communion, the Lord is not only with you. He is in you for the purpose of acting through you. This is what it means to have the Holy Spirit, who is the way Christ remains present in the here and now, prior to his return in glory.
Esta sigue siendo la celebración de la Fiesta de Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe para los gringos. Esto está bien. Yo soy un gringo.
Este año, la Fiesta de Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe cae el domingo de Gaudete. Esto nos da una razón más para regocijarnos. El martes y miércoles pasados, celebramos la Solemnidad de la Immaculada Concepción de la Santísima Virgen María. Bajo la bandera de la Immaculada Concepción, la Santísima Virgen es patrona de los Estados Unidos. Bajo el título de Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe, es la patrona de las Américas: Norte y Sur, y patrona secundaria de la diocesis de Salt Lake City.
This year, the Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe falls on Gaudete Sunday. This gives us a further reason to rejoice. Last Tuesday and Wednesday, we observed the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Under the banner of Immaculate Conception, the Blessed Virgin is patroness of the United States. Under the title Our Lady of Guadalupe, she is the patroness of the Americas: North and South, as well as the secondary patroness of the Diocese of Salt Lake City.
Estas diferentes manifestaciones culturales de la Virgen sirven para señalar no sólo la universalidad de la Iglesia, sino su diversidad. Sólo un Dios-Padre, Hijo y Espíritu Santo- es una comunión de personas, una unidad en la diversidad, la Iglesia también lo es. Estar unidos en la fe no es ser esclavizado por una uniformidad impuesta. Como San Pablo escribe en su Carta a los Gálatas: “Es por la libertad que Cristo nos ha hecho libres.” La fe en Cristo nos libera para ser quienes Dios nos hizo ser tanto individual como colectivamente.
These different cultural manifestations of Our Lady serve to point out not only the Church’s universality but its diversity. Just as God- Father, Son, and Holy Spirit- is a communion of persons, a unity in diversity, the Church is also. To be united in faith is not to be enslaved by an imposed uniformity. As Paul writes in his Letter to the Galatians: “It is for freedom that Christ has set us free.”9 Faith in Christ frees us to be who God made us to be both individually and collectively.
Para los cristianos, “el agua es más espesa que la sangre, es decir, el agua del bautismo es más espesa que la sangre de la herencia biológica". Renacemos en el bautismo como hijos de Dios a través de Jesucristo por el poder del Espíritu Santo. Por lo tanto, pertenecemos a la familia de Dios, la Iglesia. Al participar de la Eucaristía estamos plenamente incorporados al Verdadero Cuerpo de Cristo. Al igual que la Virgen María y Juan el Bautista, debemos ser precursores la segunda venida de Cristo viviendo y predicando las buenas noticias por el poder del Espíritu Santo.
For Christians, “Water is thicker than blood- that is, the water of baptism is thicker than the blood of biological inheritance.”10 We are reborn in baptism as children of God through Jesus Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit. Therefore, we belong to the family of God, the Church. By our partaking of the Eucharist, we are fully incorporated into Christ’s True Body. Like the Blessed Virgin and John Baptist, we are to be forerunners of Christ’s return by living and preaching the good news by the power of the Holy Spirit.
Debemos hacer todo por el poder del Espíritu Santo. De ahí que la invocación Veni Sancte Spiritus, Veni per Mariam, como señaló Luigi Giussani, “es la síntesis de todo lo que nos dice el año litúrgico. Es la síntesis de todo lo que nos dice la memoria de la vida cristiana. Porque todo, todo viene del Espíritu Santo”.
We are to do everything by the power of the Holy Spirit. Hence, the invocation Veni Sancte Spiritus, Veni per Mariam (i.e., Come Holy Spirit, come through Mary), as Luigi Giussani noted, “is the synthesis of everything the liturgical year tells us. It is the synthesis of everything the memory of Christian life tells us. Because everything, everything comes from the Holy Spirit.”11
Because the Holy Spirit is the mode of Christ’s resurrection presence in us, among us, and through us until he returns in glory and because of Mary’s “Yes!” in accepting God’s will for her, the Holy Spirit does, indeed, veni per Mariam- ven a través de María-come through Mary.
1 Zephaniah 3:14.↩
2 Philippians 4:4.↩
3 Second Vatican Council, Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World [Gaudium et spes], sec. 4.↩
4 Pope John XXIII, “Pope John’s Opening Speech to the Council,” in The Documents of Vatican II: With Notes and Comments by Catholic, Protestant, and Orthodox Authorities. Ed. Walter M. Abbott, S.J. and Very Rev Msgr Joseph Gallagher. New York: Guild Press, 1966, 712.↩
5 Ibid.↩
6 Philippians 4:5.↩
7 The Roman Missal, Order of Mass, Liturgy of the Word, sec. 18.↩
8 Gerard Manley Hopkins, “As Kingfishers Catch Fire,” in Hopkins: Poems and Prose, Tenth Printing. Ed. Peter Washington. Alfred A. Knopf: New York, 18.↩
9 Galatians 5:1.↩
10 Giles Fraser, Chosen: Lost and Found Between Judaism and Christianity, 133.↩
11 Luigi Giussani, “Notes from Remarks at the Memores Domini Spiritual Retreat” at La Thuile, 2 August 2001.↩
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