Kingdom Revelator Australia – Issue 43
Welcome to the Advent issue of Kingdom Kingdom Revelator. The First Sunday of Advent marks the start of a new Year in the Catholic Church, so let us be the first to wish you a happy and holy New Year in Christ Jesus!
I was recently thinking about how the world has appropriated Advent and Christmas time for its own commercial ends. The media, the High Street and the Internet are constantly bombarding us with the perfect presents for our loved ones. There are so many things that you can buy for them to show your love and make them ‘really happy’. Christmas shopping has become very stressful as you have so many choices to consider. This misses the whole point of Advent as a time to prepare for Christmas. Yes, it is a time to show your loved ones that you care for them and want to spend time with them but for many people it is more about how many parties they are invited to and how full their social calendar is. In his homily at Midnight Mass in The Vatican last Christmas, Pope Francis said, “Jesus was born rejected by some and regarded by many others with indifference. Today too, that same indifference can exist, whenever Christmas becomes a holiday with ourselves at the centre rather than Jesus; when the lights of shop windows push the light of God into the shadows; when we are enthused about gifts but in different to our neighbors in need. This worldliness has kidnapped Christmas; we need to liberate it!”
He went on to say, “With the shepherds, let us enter into the real Christmas, bringing to Jesus all that we are,our alienation, our unhealed wounds, our sins. Then, in Jesus, we will enjoy the taste of the true spirit of Christmas: the beauty of being loved by God. With Mary and Joseph, let us pause before the manger, before Jesus who is born as bread for my life. Contemplating His humble and infinite love, let us simply tell Him, “Thank you. Thank you because you have done all this for me.”