Let us Hope and Let us Act

“Sing aloud O daughter Zion; shout, O Israel! Rejoice and exult with all your heart, O daughter of Jerusalem! ... Do not fear, O Zion; do not let your hands grow weak. The Lord, your God is in your midst, a warrior who gives victory; he will rejoice over you with gladness, he will renew you in his love. The Lord your God will exult over you with loud singing as on a day of festival.” (Zephaniah 3:14ff) God will save, there is hope, and that is why we can’t not rejoice. The third Sunday of Advent, traditionally called “Gaudete” Sunday, is an invitation to rejoice in the hope of God’s intervention. Gaudete means precisely this, “Rejoice!”

There is hope. Things can change. But hope is not about doing and saying nothing while expecting God to fix everything that is wrong. “Do not let your hands grow weak.” Would it be right to think that there is nothing we can do to make a difference for the better? “Give thanks to the Lord, call on His Name, make known His deeds among the nations” (Isaiah 12:4), among our families and friends maybe…? There is so much good we can do. People asked St. John the Baptist, “What should we do?” (Luke 3:10ff) Hopefully, since last week, we are already trying to pray better, to repent of our sins so our prayers are better heard, trying to pray well—that is, in faith, trustingly, with ardent desire, etc…Now, what should we do next . . . ?

More than suggesting particular actions today, I want to show that we need to act. The point is the following: if we want God to act, we need to do our part. Not God’s part, our part. There is something only God can do, but there is something we can do as well. Only God can restore to health a terminally ill person, but we can go to the doctor, we can take care of that ill person as much as we can, and we can pray for a miracle. Only God can multiply the fish and loaves and feed thousands, but we can give Him the five loaves and the two fish from our own lunch bag. Only God can restore sight to the blind, but the blind can ask for sight, and pray in faith. Only God can knock at the door of a person’s soul, but we can knock at the door of a person’s house—with an invitation to Church. Only God can speak to a person’s heart, but we can certainly speak to people’s ears. Only God can give grace, but we can give our time. Only God can prepare the Banquet of Heaven, but we can sell the tickets…

You see what I mean? None of us can produce repentance in any person, none of us can produce forgiveness, nor grace, nor the gifts of the Holy Spirit. We are not God. But God wants us to preach repentance, to knock at the door of whoever commits sin among us, and to welcome them when they come back. God wants us to be, not the Good News, but the bearers of Good News; not the Bread from Heaven, but those who give out the Bread from Heaven to the hungry; we are not the Word of God, but we can certainly speak the Word; we cannot be Jesus, but—in a sense—we can be Mary, bringing Jesus to all those in our time who desperately need Him.

God does not want to do for us what we ourselves could do. He is a good father, and a good father does not do for his children what they can do themselves. But the good news is, that if we do our part, God will do His part. He cannot be surpassed in generosity. If you give Him more, He will give you everything. If you give Him everything, He will give you even more. If you give Him your five loaves, He will feed thousands, beginning with you. My friends, I wonder if the reason we don’t see more miracles in our churches is that we are not giving our five loaves. God is not asking us to perform miracles, but to do what we can. He will do the miracles. Now, are we doing what we can? Are we inviting people, are we giving our time? Are we praying with confidence and ardent desire? And most importantly, are we concerned with our own daily conversion? When we are not sorry for our sins, our words are empty: our prayers get to the roof of the church, but not to Heaven; and our words get to the ears of our brothers and sisters, but not to their hearts. If we are sorry for our sins and we try to grow in love, our words obtain the power of the Holy Spirit. Our human words become the Word of God when the Holy Spirit dwells in our hearts. Dear friends, if we made more room for the Holy Spirit in our hearts, anything we do would be much more powerful, because it would not be just ourselves, but the Holy Spirit working through us.

In this Advent, may we do what we can, so that God may do in our lives and in our churches what only He can do. May He fill our churches with grace, may He renew our parishes and work the miracles we long to see. God bless you all.