SEEING THE LIGHT

A SERMON FOR THE 4TH SUNDAY IN ADVENT

We’ve been hearing a lot about St. John the Baptist lately.  In fact, this cousin of our Lord is a key factor in the Incarnation and Birth of Christ.  On this fourth Sunday of Advent, just two days before Christmas, we learn what’s so important about St. John the Baptist, and the significance of his role in the story of our Redemption.  See how today’s Gospel begins; look at the solemnity with which the announcement of the Advent of the Son of God is made.  And take note that this announcement is about the coming of the Messiah, not to his chosen people, and certainly not yet to the Gentiles and the world at large. This is a ceremonial proclamation of the coming of our Saviour first of all to his cousin, the son of Zacharias and nephew of the Blessed Virgin Mary, the man known as John the Baptist.

The announcement could not be more solemn: “Now in the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar, Pontius Pilate being the governor of Judaea, Herod being the tetrarch of Galilee.. Annas and Caiphas being the high priests,” and so on—the evangelist Luke is making absolutely sure that we know exactly when this event takes place.  It is an event of great historical significance, and St. Luke wants to emphasize this by placing it in its historical context.  We know exactly when the Son of God, the “Word of God” “came unto John the Baptist in the wilderness.

Our Lord goes down to the waters of Jordan, and St. John the Baptist’s mission is confirmed.  For it is he who has been chosen from time’s hidden beginnings to cry out in that wilderness, “Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make his paths straight;” chosen from all time to prophesy of the coming of the Messiah, and of that time when “every valley shall be filled, and every mountain and hill made low, and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough places plain, and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.”  It is St. John’s great mission to announce the coming of the Saviour, to repeat to them the words of the prophet Isaiah, that the people who walk in darkness shall see a great light.  With him we cry out to the world, “Rejoice, rejoice, Emmanuel shall come thee, O Israel.”

John the Baptist had already been prepared by God for this mission. How?  Remember the Second Joyful Mystery of the Rosary?  The Visitation of the Blessed Virgin Mary to her cousin Elizabeth, when the child in Elizabeth’s womb leapt for joy at the coming of the Christ Child in Mary’s womb. Like the people of Israel, both babies still dwelt in darkness, in their case the darkness of the womb.  And yet the unborn John the Baptist would experience the joy already of knowing that the people who dwelt in darkness would see a great light.  He himself, while yet in the darkness of the womb, saw this light at the moment of Mary’s visitation.  He saw it because the child of Mary’s womb wasthat light, the great light of the world that had come to be a light to lighten the gentiles and to be the glory of his people Israel.  And with the vision of that Light, John’s soul was cleansed from the stain of original sin.  He who was to be known as John the Baptist himself received Baptism from the visitation of the Word of God.

John was the first to see the Light of the World.  And when he was born, he was the only man ever to be born without original sin.  It is no coincidence that his birthday is exactly six months earlier than the Nativity of our Saviour in Bethlehem.  Nor it is a coincidence that John’s birth coincides with the summer solstice, while our Lord’s Nativity takes place at the winter solstice.  “He must increase,” said St. John Baptist, “but I must decrease.” John was born on Midsummer Day, and after his nativity the days start to grow shorter, and darkness begins to stretch its lengthening shadow over the land.  But after Christ’s birth, the opposite happens and the days grow longer again as the light begins to replace the darkness.    The people who live in darkness, shall, like St. John, see a great light, the light that shines out of the manger of Bethlehem from the Son of God, and light reflected in nature by the sun in the heavens.  And like St. John, we should leap with joy as we prepare the way of the Lord by repenting our sins and making our crooked paths straight and our rough places plain.