Second Sunday of Advent: Look to the East, Hope
Today we hear a beautiful reading from the book of Baruch, written most likely, about 200 years before Jesus’ birth. At the time of its writing, many of the Jewish people were scattered, living in various outlying areas. The author of this book and his community, lived in either Egypt or Babylon, and writes from the perspective of a Jewish figure named Baruch who had lived some 350 years earlier. Baruch and his community of Jews were also exiles, having been forcibly taken from Judea and made captives of Babylon. Whether of Baruch’s or this author’s time, the idea of going home would have had special meaning, as going home almost always does.
In today’s reading, Baruch sings a message of comfort and hope to Mother Jerusalem, weeping over her children who had been snatched from her arms. “Jerusalem, take off your robe of mourning and misery; put on the splendor of glory from God forever…Up, Jerusalem! Stand upon the heights; look to the east and see your children…Led away on foot by their enemies they left you: but God will bring them back to you.” God’s children were displaced. But it’s true of us as well. C.S. Lewis once said that “if we find that nothing in this world entirely satisfies, the most logical explanation is that we were made for another world”. Advent reminds us that we are made for another world, but furthermore to call to mind that, that other world that awaits us is the basis of our hope.
I reminders that hope is one of the three theological virtues—faith, hope and love—that were give to us at baptism. But it can be so hard to be people of hope, especially given so much heaviness that looms in our lives: tragedies and horrific events of people doing great harm to others; or loved ones whose hearts are shrouded in sadness and emptiness; or the realities of yet another wave of virus which presents us with still more uncertainty, and so much more.
Given the fears and feelings of helplessness that all this imposes upon us, sometimes it seems that the only escape from it all is distraction and busying ourselves. But the causes for fear remain, as does the restlessness within. Advent calls us to stop, to refocus and to contemplate the very basis for our hope: Christ’s coming to usher-in the something better, the world for which our hearts long. The more we keep that promise before us, the more we foster hope within.
Baruch said to the people of his time: “Look to the east”. In other words, keep your attention—your minds and hearts—focused on God’s promise, rather than the things that only kill your hope. Whether it’s so much noise and negativity that comes through what we absorb through TV and social media, or anything else, we need to make sure we give at least some of our energy and consciousness—giving ourselves some quiet, some time for prayer, but also engaging resources that help—that at least some is directed toward the hope and promise that Baruch says will come from the east. Otherwise, hope dies within us.
But another way we do so is to be agents of hope. The more that we can bring hope to others, the more we come to nurture hope within. It’s true, part of what nurtures hope lies in reaching out to others in need, lifting them up. It draws us out of ourselves and orients us toward hope.
This happens to be the weekend in Advent each year when we are asked to contribute toward Catholic Community Services, the agency by which Catholics of Washington serve those of our state who need access to affordable housing; assisting seniors who struggle in low-income, helping to provide outpatient chemical dependency treatment services for those wouldn’t be able to otherwise afford it, and so much more. 90% of what is given to CCS goes directly to the services they provide, so the donations go where we want them to go—to those in need. I ask you to consider giving a few dollars—or more, if so compelled—to be agents of hope for others, echoing the words of Baruch: “Jerusalem, take off your robe of mourning and misery; put on the splendor of glory from God forever…Up, Jerusalem! Stand upon the heights...”
Finally, I want to mention a third way to live in hope: that is to properly deal with our own personal sin—and that includes me too—to make a sacrificial confession, to make our hearts ready to receive the source of our hope, born unto us at Christmas. Do not let pride or your fears prevent you from unburdening your heart of whatever has accumulated on it since your last confession, whatever you need to at last leave behind. If you’re struggling to find hope, it may be in part, due to a need to encounter Christ in the confessional—Christ the compassionate healer.
If we as Christian people, fail to be a sign of hope, we’ve lost our way and have likely become focused on the wrong things. Like the Jews of Baruch’s time, who together looked to the east, that they might find their way to Mother Jerusalem, you and I, throughout our lives, are called to together look toward the promise of the east, and like Jesus himself, to be a sign of hope for the world around us.