A homily for the Second Sunday of Advent, December 5, 2021
Bar 5:1-9, Phil 1:4-6, 8-11, Lk 3:1-6
Sometimes a twisty road is the one to take.
A twisty road might hug a riverbank or an ocean shoreline. It might wrap around the side of a mountain or follow the contours of a valley. It may be twisty because it’s zig-zag terraced up the side of a hill, and that was the safest way to get the path to the other side.
More simply put, a road with plentiful curves often hews to the reality that nature — and God — laid out.
So when John the Baptizer cries out Isaiah’s words
Prepare the way of the Lord, make straight his paths. Every valley shall be filled and every mountain and hill shall be made low. The winding roads shall be made straight, and the rough ways made smooth…
is he defying Nature? Is he thumbing his nose at the reality of his time or ours?
Or is he calling on all of us to help perfect it?
To be sure, each of us wants the shortest path between ourselves and the Love of God, and, in return, from God to ourselves. And we all should recognize that God deserves honor and adoration, which for a human dignitary would include a red carpet laid laser-straight.
So preparing the Way of the Lord as John and Isaiah bellowed does make sense, at least figuratively.
Yes, John is voting for repentance and striving to achieve perfection.
Prepare ye, indeed.
In this Advent season of preparation, we can straighten up our lives the way we’d straighten up our living and dining rooms to welcome a holiday guest. We know what parts of ourselves need figurative washing and dusting and redecorating to be ready for the present that is the presence of God through the Nativity less than three weeks away.
But as with all of Christ’s teachings, with all of the impact God-With-Us has had and continues to have on this fragile Earth, we cannot simply look inward for what needs steaming and stretching and sanding and bulldozing and blasting. Because if we make straight the path that connects God and our hearts, renewing and re-energizing our relationship with the Divine within us and all around us, then our eyes will see the obstacle-laden paths our sisters and brothers may be on.
And we must act, in God’s Holy Name.
The first way we act is to look for wanderers who are traversing the twisty roads that society has constructed.
Some of our sisters and brothers may be following the un-straight path by choice: They choose to turn their backs on God’s love. It’s not our place to judge them, but we do owe them — as fellow children of God, whether they accept that fact or not — we owe them a good example of the joys of living in the light of love and peace. The way we live our lives must be a beacon for them to follow back home to God. Our actions must speak louder than any words of our own.
Some wanderers on meandering trails don’t know they’re wandering because they don’t know of God at all. We who do have a relationship with the Divine can exude the same joy to them as we did for those who abandoned God and, if asked, we can try to explain what it’s like to have God at the center of our lives.
Some wanderers on twisty byways may have been pushed there by a society that values elites like governors and tetrarchs and caesars more than the simpler folks whom we’ve come to recognize as essential, or reveres the hoi-polloi more than people out of the mainstream whose gifts and talents or skin color or choice of whom to love don’t graph them on the fat spot of the bell curve. They need to know there is a place for them on the main roads, because the main roads have room enough for everyone.
Main roads. A to B. The straight and narrow, as Jesus taught us. Advent gives us the chance to re-evaluate the path we choose.
Recalculating…
And yet, sometimes we do need to take an actual twisty road — as opposed to the metaphorical ones we just discussed — to be awed by the beauty and intricacy of God’s creation. That beauty is itself a source of profound joy. Creation is proof of God’s love, for which we should be grateful.
