From the Desk of Deacon Dave, O.F.S.

 Dear sisters and brothers in Christ,

 May the Lord give you His peace!

 This weekend finds us already celebrating the Second Sunday of Advent! As we move steadily into a new liturgical year, the Church nourishes us with a new cycle of readings from Sacred Scripture, Year C for the Sunday readings and Cycle I for the weekday readings in Ordinary Time.

 The Universal Norms for the Liturgical Year and the Calendar (39) has this instruction about the season of Advent and its meaning for us: “Advent has a two-fold character, for it is a time of preparation for the Solemnities of Christmas, in which the First Coming of the Son of God to humanity is remembered, and likewise a time when, by remembrance of this, minds and hearts are led to look forward to Christ’s Second Coming at the end of time. For these two reasons, Advent is a period of devout and expectant delight.” Additionally, it seems entirely reasonable and beneficial to use this time to prepare ourselves spiritually for that moment – known to God alone – when He will come for us at the end of our individual pilgrimages on earth. The message: we must always be prepared for the coming of the Lord!

 Advent is a season of anticipation. It recalls the hopes of our Hebrew ancestors, so often expressed during Advent in the words we hear from the writings of the Prophet Isaiah, which we believe were realized in Christ’s initial coming. It is also a season of our own future hope. That these hopes are not just wishful thinking but grounded in the reality of our faith becomes evident in a posture of moral awareness and wakefulness. The message: we must always be prepared for the coming of the Lord!

 The Church expresses this Advent sense of expectation and longing for the coming of the Lord during the praying of the Lord’s Prayer at each Eucharistic liturgy when the priest celebrant adds the following words to the community’s prayer: “Deliver us, Lord, we pray, from every evil, graciously grant peace in our days, that, by the help of your mercy, we may be always free from sin and safe from all distress, as we await the blessed hope and the coming of our Savior, Jesus Christ.” The message: we must always be prepared for the coming of the Lord!

 May this holy season of Advent and the beginning of a new year of God’s grace draw us closer to the Lord and to one another in the communion of the Church! May the Gospel of the Lord truly be our rule of life – to the glory and praise of our Triune God! 

 With a brother’s love in the Lord and Mary Immaculate,

 Deacon Dave, O.F.S.
T    In Persona Christi Servi