Running Forth Like the Centurion, First Monday of Advent, December 2, 2019

Fr. Roger J. Landry
Visitation Mission of the Sisters of Life, Manhattan
Monday of the First Week of Advent
December 2, 2019
Is 4:2-6, Ps 122, Mt 8:5-11

To listen to an audio recording of this homily, please click below: 

• In Advent, we focus first and foremost on the Lord’s coming. The word Advent itself means “coming” and points to the fact that during this season we renew our awareness that Christ is coming to us in history, mystery and majesty: history in Bethlehem; mystery in the Sacraments, prayer and in those made in his image and likeness; and in majesty at the end of time and the end of our lives. But we don’t wait passively. Christ’s coming is not the only action in this season. As we prayed yesterday in the collect to begin the Mass, we beg the Father for the grace of “resolve to run forth to meet” his Son “with righteous deeds at his coming.” Like the wise bridesmaids in Jesus’ parable (Mt 25), we head out to meet him not merely at times that are convenient but in the middle of the night with lighted lamps. For us to run forth, we need to train, like sprinters in track-and-field, and train not just our physical muscles but our heart and spirit. “Running” to meet Christ who is coming is not principally something external, but interior. Today’s readings, especially the figure of the Roman Centurion in the Gospel, models for us those interior virtues we need this Advent and beyond to run out to encounter the Lord. In the Gospel, the centurion hears that Jesus is on his way to Capernaum, but he’s not content just to wait for him to show up. He goes out to meet him along the way and meets him at the edge of the city. And he went out with various essential Advent attributes.
• First, he went out to meet him with faith. Jesus is amazed that he, a non-Jew, has so much faith and exclaims, “In no one in Israel have I found such faith.” The Centurion had a confident assurance that God could give him the miracle that he sought, even if he didn’t see it done. At the beginning of Advent, we can assess whether we go out to meet the Lord in history, mystery and majesty with this type of faith.
• The second Advent disposition we see in the Centurion is what is at the root of that faith, a sense of obedience that makes him trust in the Lord’s authority. “I too am a man subject to authority,” he said, “with soldiers subject to me. And I say to one, ‘Go,’ and he goes; and to another, ‘Come here,’ and he comes; and to my slave, ‘Do this,’ and he does it.” The Lord Jesus was amazed at that confident faith, something that came from regular obedience of those in authority and grasping with what authority Christ himself must be acting. To be obedient is to act on what one hears. In Hebrew to “hear” and to “obey” are the same word when it comes to hearing God. That’s why St. Paul in his letter to the Romans talked about the goal of the Christian life as the “obedience of faith” (Rom 1:5, 16:26). Faith leads to obedience and obedience similarly strengthens our faith, since we know that the Lord acts with the authority of the one who created the heavens and the earth. Advent is a time to run forth in faith-filled obedience to God and his commands.
• The third Advent virtue also strengthens our faith. It’s humility. When Jesus, having encountered the Centurion, says that he will come to the his home to heal his servant, the Centurion replies that he is not worthy to have Jesus enter his home. Even though he was a powerful leader in the Roman army with many men subject to his beck and call, he was still humble and recognized before Jesus that he did not merit even a visit. He recognized that he had to be humble before Jesus, whom he regarded obviously as far more than a Jewish carpenter, but intuited that Jesus far outranked him as at least the emissary of God. Advent is a season of humility in which we recognize that we’re not worthy of the Lord who is coming, a reality that is meant to fill us with gratitude at the awesome privilege we have of encountering the Lord. There’s a reason why we use the Centurion’s very words every time we prepare to meet Christ at his coming in mystery during Mass. Advent is a time to advance in the humble awe toward the Lord’s action.
• The fourth Advent disposition is to compact unity. The centurion was united in solidarity with his servant and interceded for him. In the Psalm today we pray, “Let us go rejoicing to the house of the Lord” and focus on how Jerusalem, a symbol of God’s people, is “built as a city with compact unity.” There’s a communal dimension to our faith that is essential to understanding what Advent is about. Jesus didn’t come into the world to save us as a whole bunch of isolated lost sheep. He came to form us into a sheepfold, into a family, into a communion. Advent is therefore a time of particularly focused spiritual and material solidarity. It’s a time that we make a pilgrimage not solo, but with other. Jesus pointed to that communion at the end of today’s Gospel scene when he promises, “I say to you, many will come from the east and the west, and will recline with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob at the banquet in the Kingdom of heaven.” It’s a pilgrimage not merely with some friends, but one that he wants to be made by people of every nation, and so it’s a journey to which we intentionally are supposed to be inviting even those we don’t know at all or know well. To make this pilgrimage well, we won’t be just doing it along with others, but united with others. We prayed in the Psalm about how the Jerusalem to which the Jews were ascending, and we ascend together spiritually, has “compact unity.” This points to the type of tight bonds of unifying love we’re called to have toward each other. The Lord wants us to make this pilgrimage together with each other, up close, you and me and all those whom the Lord places together with us. He wants us to help each other. And one of the greatest ways we help each other is through our prayer, which is another key aspect of today’s reading and our overall Advent dispositions. Just like the centurion’s servant, we all need healing and we need to pray for each other to receive the healing and salvation Christ brings, even at a distance.
• The fifth disposition is joy. We prayed six times in the Psalm, “Let us go rejoicing to the house of the Lord.” Our joint pilgrimage is one meant to be done with great happiness and enthusiasm. We’re supposed to say, “I rejoiced when they said to me, “We will go up to the house of the Lord!” Jesus came into our world so that his joy might be in us and our joy might be complete (Jn 15:11). The Archangel Gabriel’s first words to Mary were “Rejoice!” On Christmas morning, the angels announced to the shepherds “good news of great joy” for all the people. The Lord wants us making the exertion to go up not out of dry duty but out of passionate, enthusiastic joy, a joy that flows from faith, a joy that comes from humility, a joy that can’t restrain itself because of the healing we’ve experienced, as we enter into God’s own joy that rejoices most of all over one repentant and reconciled sinner.
• So as the Lord comes to us this Advent, we run out to meet him with faith, obedience, humility, unity, and joy. And the best way we grow in these dispositions is here at Mass as we prepare now to meet Jesus with faith, acknowledging him as our Lord and God; with humility, recognizing we’re not worthy to receive him; together with others, made “one Body, one Spirit” in Christ; with joy, because we’re about to receive within the “pearl of great price!,” and open to allowing his glory to flow through us as sap from vine to branches. Our response to the Mass is to say, “Let us go rejoicing to the house of the Lord” so that he may “instruct us in his ways” in the Liturgy of the Word and so that he might strengthen us to “walk in his paths” by entering into us in the Liturgy of the Eucharist. This is where our Advent begins.

The readings for today’s Mass were: