November 30, The First Sunday of Advent
Is 63:16b-17, 19b; 64:2-7/1; Cor 1:3-9;Mk 13:33-37
Keep awake – for you do not know when the master of the house will come, in the evening, or at midnight, or at cockcrow, or at dawn, or else he may find you asleep. Keep awake! Mk. 35-36
In the first reading, Isaiah shouts at me and I want to shout back, “Tear open the heavens and come down! Come down like the mountains in an earthquake, flaming like fire in brushwood to make your name known! Come, from somewhere powerful in you distant heavens, and cast your fire on those who start these wars and cause all this hunger and sickness.”
But, in the hollow silence that follows my tirade, I know you are not in the heavens but right here. You are here in your Wisdom in me, in this human community, and in our kinship with all creation. “Come” becomes my own call to wake up to what is right here, right now. It’s my call to open my eyes and reach out to the hands and paws and wings of my kin and hold on tight. Choosing justice and choosing peace these days is sure to give a bumpy ride.
Mantra: Wake me up! Open my eyes!
Kay McMullen, SNDdeN
