Celebrate Sunday Mass - 12.17.23
DECEMBER 17, 2023 -- The Third Sunday of Advent
Photo by KaLisa Veer on Unsplash
12/18/2023 (4 months ago)
By Deacon Keith Fournier
My friends, brothers, and sisters in the Lord,
The third Sunday of Advent is traditionally called Gaudete Sunday. The word means Rejoice. It is the Sunday of Rejoicing in the Liturgical calendar of the Catholic Church. Difficulties, stress, and even tragedy - experiences which at first glance seem to cause us to respond with anything but joy, can be transformed in the life of a believer and become its very source, when Jesus is the Lord of your life.
Once again, we encounter John the Baptizer in our Gospel reading (John 1:6-8,19-28) He recognizes the fulfillment of all the messianic promises in the Hebrew Scriptures has come - in the person of Jesus Christ! John is a man of living faith whose eyes have been opened. He is held out to us a model for good reason. No matter what his circumstances, he is always watching for the Lord. Are we?
Jesus said of John: "Amen, I say to you, among those born of women there has been none greater than John the Baptist; yet the least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he. (Matt. 11:11)
This Sunday is also meant to remind us that in the coming of Jesus Christ we find the very source of Joy itself - Jesus Christ is the source of real and lasting Joy. When He comes into the life of a believer, he or she receives a joy that can never be taken away. They are also given grace, the divine life, they need to begin to see that the Lord is always coming, He is always near to those who live their lives in Him and watch for Him.
St. Paul wrote to the Philippians: Brothers and sisters: Rejoice in the Lord always. I shall say it again: rejoice! Your kindness should be known to all. The Lord is near. Have no anxiety at all, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, make your requests known to God. Then the peace of God that surpasses all understanding will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. (Phil. 4:4-7)
He gave the Thessalonians the same direction in his letter to them, Rejoice always. Pray without ceasing. In all circumstances give thanks, for this is the will of God for you in Christ Jesus. (1 Thes.5: 16 - 24) We need to hear these words today. It seems that no matter where you look, there is bad news! However, the pain, hurt, fear, worry, and that awful killer on the loose in our modern mania, stress, need not distract us from the source of true Joy, Jesus!
In times like this that I thank God for the great gift of the Catholic liturgical year. Our mother, the Church invites us to enter more deeply into our faith by living and celebrating them liturgically. The Feasts we celebrate, and our preparation for them, are an invitation to participate, even now, in the life to come. That is what Gaudete Sunday, the Sunday of rejoicing, is meant to do for us.
Christian joy is not rooted in the negative circumstances and struggles of our daily lives. Often, they are the bad fruit of the disorder and brokenness which is caused by sin. Christian Joy finds its root in the relationship we now have in and through Jesus Christ, with the Father, in the Holy Spirit, which helps us to not only endure them, but to be transformed by them.
We rejoice today because the Lord is always near - He is always coming to those who have the eyes of living faith. One of the Psalms we regularly chant in the Liturgy of the Hours reminds us of this truth, "The LORD is close to the brokenhearted, saves those whose spirit is crushed. Many are the troubles of the just, but the LORD delivers from them all." (Psalm 34:19,20)
In just a matter of days we will celebrate the Feast of the Nativity of the Lord. The Church as mother and teacher calls us on the third Sunday of Advent to pause from our Advent preparation. She summons us in the liturgy by using the imperative case to - "Rejoice!" Bishops, priests and deacons have, up to this point, worn purple or lavender vestments symbolizing the penitential nature of our Advent preparation. On this Sunday they are replaced with vestments of a rose color, a color of joy.
The General Instructions for the Roman Missal (GIRM) explain the reasons for color of our vestments in the Church of the Latin Rite: The purpose of a variety of color of the sacred vestments is to give effective expression even outwardly to the specific character of the mysteries of faith being celebrated and to a sense of Christian life's passage through the course of the liturgical year.
In another beautiful Old Testament reading from Zephaniah, frequently found in our Advent liturgies, we meet the God who rejoices over us! Fear not, O Zion, be not discouraged! The LORD, your God, is in your midst, a mighty savior; he will rejoice over you with gladness, and renew you in his love, he will sing joyfully because of you, as one sings at festivals. (Zeph 3)
As Christians we know that the Lord has come, in the Incarnation of the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity. The Word has become flesh and He has dwelt among us (John 1). Life is forever changed, and the world is being recreated in Him. On this day we pause to remember that He has come, He is coming, and He will come again. We find our Joy in an encounter with Him. We who live our lives now in His Mystical Body, the Church are freed from our bondage and called to rejoice!
John the Baptizer knew that the source of joy is Jesus Christ. John calls everyone who will listen to prepare the way for the Lord - in their hearts, their lives, their homes and their world. In both his preaching and his life witness he calls for a total reformation. Because the Lord is near, we must live differently. The way of true joy passes along the path of self-emptying, the way of humility. The Baptizer reminds us that we must decrease so that we can be filled with Jesus, the source of all joy. The way to joy is through self-emptying love.
This lifestyle change should characterize Christians. It is why, before they were called Christians, they were referred to as "the Way" (See, e.g., Acts 22:4). John told the crowds, "I am baptizing you with water, but one mightier than I is coming. I am not worthy to loosen the thongs of his sandals. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. (Luke 3) We have received that Baptism, and with it all the grace we need to respond to the invitation.
John's humility is the road on which we are all invited to walk. He became a man of Joy because he was a man of humility! He understood it wasn't all about him! It isn't all about us! John emptied himself - of himself - and thereby became one who could reveal Jesus to others. His humility opened a space within him for true joy, the kind which comes from the real presence of the Lord.
Living in the first home of the whole human race, his mother's womb, this last Prophet of the Old Testament and First Prophet of the New responded to the arrival of Jesus with a dance and just kept living in joy.
The Gospel account records the visit of Mary to Elizabeth: When Elizabeth heard Mary's greeting, the infant leaped in her womb, and Elizabeth, filled with the Holy Spirit, cried out in a loud voice and said, are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb. And how does this happen to me that the mother of my Lord should come to me?
"For at the moment the sound of your greeting reached my ears, the infant in my womb leaped for joy. Blessed are you who believed that what was spoken to you by the Lord would be fulfilled." And Mary said: "My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord; my spirit rejoices in God my savior. (Luke 1: 41-47)
Joy fills Elizabeth and inspires Mary to sing a canticle of praise - and causes the child John to dance in the womb. Joy is a Person - named Jesus. When we encounter Him, we encounter lasting Joy.
In the fourth Gospel, the theologian John records the Baptizer explaining the source of his supernatural joy, "The one who has the bride is the bridegroom; the best man, who stands and listens for him, rejoices greatly at the bridegroom's voice. So this joy of mine has been made complete. He must increase; I must decrease." (John 1:29 - 30)
As we walk through the remaining days of Advent, the two biblical persons held before us in our readings at Mass and in the Liturgy of the Hours will be John the Baptizer and Mary. Mary's humility brought heaven to earth and earth to heaven. Mary was a woman of deep joy because she became the habitation of happiness, the first living tabernacle. She overflows with Jesus and imparts joy to us all. We call her, among her many other wonderful titles, the "cause of our Joy". That is because she bore the One who is its source, Jesus Christ.
We can find this joy, this genuine happiness, beginning today, no matter what our circumstances. The Apostle Paul lived an arduous life of discipleship. He suffered physically, relationally and spiritually. Yet, he too was a man of this kind of joy. We hear it in his admonitions to the early Church found in his letters. Christian joy does not depend on circumstances, but on a relationship. A relationship with the Lord who always comes to those who have eyes opened by living faith.
On this Gaudete Sunday let us embrace by grace the way of humility and find the happiness of heaven - beginning on earth. St. Josemaria Escriva, a Saint of our own time who teaches us that the universal call to holiness embraces every vocation and state in life, once wrote, "I am every day more convinced that happiness in Heaven is for those who know how to be happy on earth." (The Forge, 1005)
On this Gaudete Sunday, rejoice because the Lord is always near!
Deacon Keith Fournier
Deacon Keith Fournier, JD, MTS, MPhil
Dean of Catholic Online School
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