PAN DE LA SEMANA

Catholic Homily/Sunday Reflection 3rd Sunday of Advent - Cycle B December 14,2008 A whole lot of joy pervades the Liturgy today. Traditionally, the Church has, for so long, set aside this third Sunday of Advent as a reflection on, an exhortation to, and as a paean to joy. Thus, the reason for its being known as Gaudete Sunday, from the word used by St. Paul in his first letter to the Thessalonians in today’s second reading, right from the first sentence of the passage. This, we all know by now. We have heard this so often, year after year. But perhaps, what we have not heard as often is what should be behind all that joy; what should go together with that joy, and what one who is joyful ought to be doing, or in fact, really does in effect. If we are to go by that old scholastic philosophical dictum, bonum diffusivum sui, goodness is self-diffusive; the tendency of good is to spread itself, then today’s exhortation to joy is a clear and convincing example. Goodness comes in clusters, a...

Catholic Homily/Sunday Gospel Reflection 2nd Sunday of Advent (B) December 7, 2008 There is comfort in the words of Isaiah the prophet today. “Comfort, give comfort to my people, says your God.” Isaiah, as we know, was writing to a people – God’s people – who have lost everything they valued more than anything else, everything that would give meaning to the appellation “people of God” … no temple, no land, no permanent abode they could call their own. Isaiah, speaking in God’s name, was giving comfort to a people who were far from comfortable and at ease in a land that was not theirs, sans place of worship, sans country, sans political power…sans everything. He spoke to a people whose suffering was … nonpareil … if you will … sans rival! Isaiah prophesied to a people who could hardly be said to be at peace. What type of peace is there for one who has been violently uprooted from one’s homeland? What sort of peace does one enjoy, far from the typical scenes of one’s birthplace, away fro...