1st Sunday Advent C - Homily 2

Homily 2 - 2009

This season of Advent raises the question: Where are we heading? Not so much: Where am I heading? but: Where are we heading? Where is our world heading? Do we as human persons, have any control over where our world is heading? And, following on from that, Have we any moral responsibility for where our world might be heading?

Climate change has been on the agenda this past week, and the eyes of the media have been trained on Canberra. And here we are, gathered in our little church in beautiful Dunkeld. Do the two worlds meet?

In our First Reading today we listened to Jeremiah. He lived during a period of social breakdown and of political and religious corruption. He had lost faith in the current leadership, and all hope of reform. He looked desperately to God, and, somehow, he hoped that, in the future, the leadership would change, and that a virtuous Branch might grow for David; that, in Jerusalem, the seat of government – the seat of power, a new approach, a new spirit, might come, summed up in a new motto, a new vision statement: The Lord our integrity.

Can you imagine the mood of Canberra, the vision statement guiding all our political decision-making: The Lord our integrity? God, God’s values, God’s ways, God’s approach, guiding what our parliament earnestly and explicitly aim for and how they seek to go about it?

Today’s Gospel has a similar sort of message to the First Reading. The language was a bit florid, but was “par for the course” in much of the literature of the time. The basic point was that the world might be in a mess: nations in agony, clamour of ocean (in the Jewish mind, the ocean was  symbol of chaos), the powers of heaven shaken. But, that’s not the whole story. It might be business as usual; but what would matter is how people would respond in the light of it all.

Jesus referred to himself as the Son of Man; (though, for some reason or other, we never seem to call him that ourselves.) It’s a powerful image. It was first used in the Book of Daniel, where it was a cryptic reference to those faithful Jews who were persecuted and executed by a ruler intent on totally breaking down that faithfulness. Daniel saw their stance for integrity constituting the criterion by which everyone else, including their persecutors, would be judged.

Jesus applied the image to himself because he saw his stance for integrity in a world that had lost its way, where might was right; where oppression was endemic; and corruption and compromise were the order of the day … his stance for integrity, despite the cost … would nevertheless be the criterion by which people could really judge what is right, where true life can be found, what responsibility calls for, and what true human growth and development involve.

Democracy is good, but there’s a catch. Unlike Jeremiah, we have a vote, and our voices contribute to public opinion. We can’t just blame the leadership – we’re all responsible for the direction our nation takes. Justice and mercy at the micro-level are indispensable – those everyday interactions we have with those who are part of our little world. 

But, as Paul wrote in today’s Second Reading: May the Lord make you love one another and the whole human race as much as we love you. Let us listen to that again: Love one another and the whole human race:

As Pope Benedict wrote recently: Love at the macro-level takes shape in justice and mercy in the arena of national and international policies. And we all share responsibility for them – we are implicated, like it or not.

Climate change is on the national agenda at the present moment, shaping up as a matter of justice at the national and the international level. Those likely to be most affected by it are the poorest of the developing world and the generations that follow ours.

Most scientists believe that human choices contribute to the fact and pace of change; some don’t. We are not scientists. But we have a responsibility to contribute to the decisions facing the world leaders. The Son of Man won’t necessarily judge by outcomes; but will judge by the degree of responsibility we exercise: The Lord our integrity.

Motivated by the mercy, justice and love that informed the heart of Jesus, may we be able to stand erect, hold our heads high … with confidence before the Son of Man.