THE WORD BECAME FLESH

Friday of second week of Advent, 2021

Isa 48:17-19

Ps 1

Matt 11:16-19

Our Lady of Loreto

Wisdom is Justified

Dear friends in Christ, in celebrating Our Lady of Loreto, all are called to imitate the virtues of the Mother of God, the perfect disciple of the Gospel, who in conceiving the head of the Church also accepted us all as her own. Pilgrims go to Loreto to pray in the little house where Mary was born and where the angel had appeared to her and where the Holy Family later lived.

In the first reading of today (Isaiah 48:17-19) God laments the fact that the people of the time of Isaiah, had failed to listen and follow his lead. Their disobedience had led them into captivity and put their future at risk. “I am the Lord your God who teaches you to profit, who leads you in the way you should go. O that you had listened to my commandments!” In this social media age, too many people find it easier to believe what is posted online, without even questioning the source or the truth of it, than to believe what they read in the bible, or what the Church teaches. The resultant effect is that, the world is on such a fast lane that everyone is trying to catch up. The catch-up syndrome leads to a lot of sharp practices and too many evils, that the world is no longer at ease. It is not too late for us to return to the right path with God. That is what the season of Advent encourages us to do—to prepare the way for the Lord. What we lack in the world today, God says is because we have failed to listen to him. “O that you had listened to my commandments! Then your peace would have been like a river, and your righteousness like the waves of the sea; your offspring would have been like the sand, and your descendants like its grains; their name would never be cut off or destroyed from before me.” Consider what the world is losing by not listening to God. If the world becomes law abiding, it will be at peace.

In the gospel (Matthew 11:16-19) Jesus calls us to reflect on our inability to choose what is good. A generation that lacks the wisdom to do the will of God, can only continue to sway like the reed in the wind. “To what shall I compare this generation? It is like children sitting in the market places and calling to their playmates, ‘We piped for you and you wouldn't dance; we wailed and you wouldn't mourn.’” Life has become more of a child’s play to many. People run from pillar to post in search for happiness and peace while they pass by the object of their search without noticing it. Too many people are busy, doing nothing. They are busy with no chance of progress, just because they wouldn't listen to God. In the hurry to achieve everything without paying attention to God, too many are crashing along the way. Do not join that bandwagon.

Let us pray: O God, give us ears that listen and hearts that are ready to do your will. Amen. 

+Remain blessed