A homily for the Second Sunday of Advent, December 4, 2022
Is 11:1-10, Rom 15:4-9, Mt 3:1-12
A while ago, I took the Ancestry DNA test, a thoughtful gift from my wife, who’s been tracing her family tree (it’s become almost a forest). There were no surprises in my results, no hidden contributors to my cellular structure from far-flung places, no clear ties to Genghis Khan or Michelangelo or Einstein.
Nope, all was as expected: Celtic on Mom’s side, Eastern and Central European on Dad’s. No surprises.
The surprise arrived a couple of months after I received my results. First, Ancestry emailed me to say the test revealed that I had potential relatives and, then, a long-lost — and until then, unknown — cousin emailed me.
It turns out, she and I share a great-grandmother.
Paula’s maternal grandmother and my paternal grandmother were sisters — my Nana and my Great-Aunt Francie, the same Aunt Francie whose wig my tipsy Nana tossed grapes into at a wedding reception and the same Aunt Francie who telephoned my Nana six months afterward wondering why there were raisins in her “fall.” (That’s what Francie called her partial B-52, though I’ve never found a dictionary that referred to it that way.)
Some sort of feud prompted Francie’s husband to sever all ties with that side of the family, which is why Paula and I, at best, only vaguely knew that each other existed, let alone were related.
We each consisted of one line in another cousin’s attempt at a family history. Kissin’ cousins we were not.
We’re not identical Patty-and-Cathy cousins, but we’re both writers and teachers and lovers of language with quirky senses of humor. Nature or nurture? Dunno.
Could there be more unknown blood-relative cousins out there? Ditto dunno.
But, as St. Paul reminds us via the way he addresses the disciples in Rome — “Brothers and Sisters” — we all are related. We all are relatives. All 8 billion of us.
All.
8 billion.
Of us.
However we interpret the story of Adam and Eve, we humans worldwide claim common ancestors along the evolutionary trail.
We in the Judaeo-Christian and Islamic traditions claim Abraham as our father, religiously, biologically, or both.
We in the monotheistic tradition claim God as our truest parent, the source of body and soul alike, gifts of pure love.
Christians reinforce that relationship through the sacrament of Baptism, which St. Paul declares to be an adoption by God, a double connection.
Even Jesus was adopted this way.
So we are rooted together in myriad ways, whether from the root of Jesse or somehow emerging between the cracks in the concrete of oppression.
We belong to one family. We belong to one race, the human race.
Are we looking for our kin?
Are we looking out for our kin?
Winter is setting in, here at the Jersey Shore and throughout America, and over in Ukraine, in Europe at large and in places we’ve never heard about. How are we seeking charity and justice for our family out in the cold?
Safe drinking water has become more valuable than fuel, more treasured than precious metals and gems, in Houston, Jackson and Flint as well as in the Middle East and war-torn lands. Do we let the faucet run while we brush our teeth?
In short, do we think about all the ways even the littlest things we do might affect the lives of our human family?
Our preparatory season of Advent — our year’s other spiritual spring cleaning besides Lent — gives us the opportunity and the impetus to check our personal GPS to ensure we’re on the straight path. It’s a path we share with everyone, so when we see someone who needs a hand to hold or a heavy burden to share, our choice is obvious.
Someone somewhere needs us.
