SWEEPING OUT THE STABLE

A SERMON FOR CHRISTMAS EVE

The season of Advent is a season of preparation. We are preparing, making ready, for an event that is about to take place.  A feeling of anticipation is in the air, a feeling that something great is about to happen. Something wonderful that has the power to change our lives and make them better.

Christmas crept up on us very quickly this year, and it’s already Christmas Eve. Today before Mass we read the solemn proclamation of Our Lord’s Nativity.  This announcement is traditionally sung at the morning Office of Prime, and places the birth of our Lord in the context of the greatest events of the world’s history.  Tomorrow a Child shall be born unto us and there shall be joy given to the world.

The world had been prepared for this great event. After many hundreds of years of war and turmoil, the western world had finally been completely subjugated by the mighty Roman Empire. All the lands surrounding the Mediterranean Sea, the center of western civilization, were now at peace, united under the Pax Romana, and ready for the coming of a single religion to complete the world’s unity.

The Holy Land itself and the Jewish people had also been prepared for the coming of their Messiah. For hundreds of years the prophets of the Old Testament had been telling of the coming of a Saviour, who would redeem them from their sin. And now finally, the greatest of all these prophets had been born, St. John Baptist, whose mission was to prepare the way of the Lord.

Most importantly of all, a mother had been chosen for this Messiah. Chosen from all eternity to be the Mother of God. And she had been suitably prepared for this mission. She had been prepared for the coming of the Son of God in her womb.  God prepared her by giving her the unique privilege of being conceived without Original Sin. Of all the Sons and Daughters of Adam, she alone was given that singular privilege.

As Advent comes to a close, we follow our Lady and St. Joseph to Bethlehem. “And thou Bethlehem,” says the Prophet Micah, “in the land of Judah, though thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee shall he come forth that is to be ruler in Israel; whose goings forth have been from of old, from everlasting.” Bethlehem, from whence had come the great King of Israel, King David.  This king was a pre-figuration of Our Lord himself.  By slaying the giant Goliath and saving the people of Israel from the Philistines, the young David was a precursor of Christ who came to vanquish the Devil and redeem his people from their sin.  King David was the ancestor of St. Joseph, as the Gospels tell us.  Joseph was of the house and lineage of David. And so when a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be taxed, and “all went to be taxed, every one to his own city,” Joseph went to his own city, David’s Royal City, Bethlehem, where the prophecy of Micah was to be fulfilled.  And in the last week of Our Lady’s Expectation, we find her accompanying her spouse to Bethlehem.

And what shall they find when tonight they complete their long and arduous journey from Galilee? Not a single inn had any room for them. Because of the huge influx of people coming to be taxed, there was no room for them at the inns of Bethlehem. And so our Lady and St. Joseph had to make do with a lowly stable, where the Son of God would be brought into the world this night and find his first resting place amid the brute beasts. Imagine how St. Joseph worked to prepare that stable to make it as suitable as he possibly could for the coming of the Most High. There would be visitors that night. Shepherds would come from the local hills, alerted by the angels and their singing of Glory Be to God in the highest. Wise men would arrive from the East, following a star of wonder, giving gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh. But most of all, the greatest visitor of all would come down from heaven to redeem his people. And so St. Joseph swept out the stable and made it ready for his coming.

There is almost no time left for us to sweep out our own stable.  Have you done so yet?  Have you prepared a place in your heart where the little Christ Child may shelter from the piercing cold of midnight?   When Our Lord comes to seek his repose in the inn of our soul, in our Christmas communion, shall we have to tell him there is no room in the inn. That our soul is already filled up.  Full of sin perhaps? Or attachment to sin?  Full of unlawful desires and affections? Full of the desire for self-gratification? Or simply filled up with affection and desire for the things of this world, the material gifts and pleasures of Christmas…

If your soul is full of these things, then do as the good St. Joseph did. Sweep out your stable. Empty it of everything that is not suitable to share a place with the Christ Child this Christmas. Make a good and holy Confession and prepare your soul to be a worthy shelter for this little baby whose only desire is to save your soul and prepare it for heaven.  I’ll be hearing Confessions today after Mass, so take advantage of this opportunity to empty your soul of anything you’d be ashamed for the Christ Child to see when he enters it. 

Let’s be clear.  You have three options to offer him when he comes on Christmas night:  you can offer him a soul that is unswept, dirty, full of attachment to venial sin, imperfection and neglect of your Christian duty.  The second option is even worse:  you can offer him a door slammed in his face, a clenched fist held to his little head, as you declare to him defiantly that you are perfectly satisfied with your mortal sins, your deliberate attachment to the things of Satan, and that there is no room for the little Infant Jesus in your inn.  He can’t make you love him.  He can’t and doesn’t want to force you to do anything.  He just wants you to freely choose the third option.  And there is a third option, a third way.  And it’s the only way that is worthy to welcome the Child who is coming to save your soul from hell.  And that is to sweep out your stable.  Sweep and repent your sins.  Sweep and make a good confession.  Keep sweeping until the stable of your soul is cleansed.  Sweep out whatever is in you that prevents his coming.  Because in this world of sin, where meek souls will receive him still, the dear Christ enters in.