{"id":2601,"date":"2017-12-17T08:00:00","date_gmt":"2017-12-17T06:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/fathernikola.org\/liturgy\/?p=2601"},"modified":"2020-12-12T13:23:51","modified_gmt":"2020-12-12T18:23:51","slug":"3rd-sunday-of-advent-cycle-b","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/fathernikola.org\/liturgy\/2017\/12\/17\/3rd-sunday-of-advent-cycle-b\/","title":{"rendered":"3rd Sunday of Advent, Cycle B"},"content":{"rendered":"

This Sunday is also called Gaudete Sunday (from the first Latin word of its entrance antiphon: Gaudete<\/em>\u2014Rejoice) and includes the first Glory to God<\/em> we\u2019ve prayed or sung on a Sunday since Advent began. Rose colored vestments are an option only two days of the year, and this is one of them. Why? It\u2019s not Christmas Day yet, but it is the day we celebrate the joyous realization that the Messiah is already here and appearing soon.<\/p>\n

In today\u2019s First Reading Isaiah reminds us that the coming of the Anointed of the Lord (\u201cThe spirit of the Lord GOD is upon me\u201d), the Messiah, is going to bring good things and is a cause for rejoicing. The anointed one brings a happy resolution to a veritable litany of afflictions: good news to the poor, healing to the sad and grieving, freedom to the imprisoned and enslaved, a blessed time, and vindication\u2014being cleared from blame for past faults. Isaiah doesn\u2019t just describe what the Anointed One will bring, but our reaction as well in language that inspired Mary\u2019s Magnificat<\/em> (see Luke 1:46-55). We rejoice because with the Messiah justice and peace will flourish as abundantly as a lush garden.<\/p>\n

In today\u2019s Second Reading St. Paul reminds us that joy should not just be our attitude when things are going great, but when things are going rotten as well, because those things pale compared to the joy Our Lord will bring us. Some may see us as airheads when we live joyfully for no apparent reason, but that\u2019s when we must explain the cause of our joy: doing God\u2019s will, aided by the Holy Spirit, can fill us with nothing other than joy. Paul encourages us to be moved by the Spirit, but this is not just sentimentalism. He teaches us to test everything to see what is truly good and what is truly evil. The good makes us profoundly happy; evil just makes us miserable if we let it. We rejoice because even though holiness is hard Our Lord has promised he will help us and he will do the heavy lifting in our sanctification. We just have to let ourselves by led by his Spirit. All the things the Messiah promises in the First Reading will be brought to us spiritually by Christ if we let him: good news, true freedom, healing, justice, and peace.<\/p>\n

In today\u2019s Gospel John the Baptist tells the priests, Levites, and Pharisees that he is not the Messiah, but that the Messiah has arrived and he is heralding him. As we saw in last week\u2019s readings, the prophet Malachi said someone would come prepare the way for the Lord (see Malachi 3:1). That someone would encourage his listeners to make straight the way of the Lord (see Isaiah 40:3): John the Baptist. John identifies himself as that person today. The amazing message of John that should fill any believing Jew with awe (hence, his skeptical visitors didn\u2019t pick up on it) was that, unlike the prophets before him, he was telling them the Messiah was already \u201camong\u201d them. The Messiah was not coming. He was already here and just hadn\u2019t \u201cgone public\u201d yet. To be fair, that would take some time for the Jews to process, because for them the Messiah would come in power and glory to \u201cclean house\u201d for them.<\/p>\n

This Gospel is apt for Advent because now we remember Our Savior in Mary\u2019s womb, about to be born. He is already among us, but hidden, waiting to be revealed. In a way this week we can celebrate the moment of salvation history when Mary becomes pregnant and Jesus\u2019 birthday draws near.<\/p>\n

Today\u2019s First Reading not only tells us the joyful things the Messiah will bring; it tells us how we can imitate him. We may not be able to do miraculous things (unless the Lord wills it), but we can bring joy into someone\u2019s life. If we\u2019re not doing that with our family, that\u2019s where we must start, but it shouldn\u2019t just stop there. Just as in other times of year there are people hurting, hungry, or simply lonely during this season. If we bring them joy, we bring them the good news that someone loves them and cares for them always: Our Lord.<\/p>\n

Readings:\u00a0Isaiah 61:1\u20132a, 10\u201311; Luke 1:46\u201350, 53\u201354; 1\u00a0Thessalonians 5:16\u201324; John 1:6\u20138, 19\u201328.<\/em><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This Sunday is also called Gaudete Sunday (from the first Latin word of its entrance antiphon: Gaudete\u2014Rejoice) and includes the first Glory to God we\u2019ve prayed or sung on a Sunday since Advent began. Rose colored vestments are an option only two days of the year, and this is one of them. Why? It\u2019s not … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2601","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p65qtw-FX","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/fathernikola.org\/liturgy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2601","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/fathernikola.org\/liturgy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/fathernikola.org\/liturgy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/fathernikola.org\/liturgy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/fathernikola.org\/liturgy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2601"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/fathernikola.org\/liturgy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2601\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2607,"href":"http:\/\/fathernikola.org\/liturgy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2601\/revisions\/2607"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/fathernikola.org\/liturgy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2601"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/fathernikola.org\/liturgy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2601"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/fathernikola.org\/liturgy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2601"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}