Bishop Barron’s Sunday Sermons - Catholic Preaching and Homilies

On this third Sunday of Advent, we hear for the first time this season of the great figure of John the Baptist. It’s not really possible to understand Jesus apart from his precursor. All four Gospels compel us to come to grips with John. His job is always the same: he points to Jesus. If we’re staring at John, we’re missing the point. Well, in our Gospel for today, John indicates the Lord in a most distinctive manner.

Last week, I spoke of preparing for the coming of the Lord using the great image from the second chapter of Isaiah: the Lord’s holy mountain. How do we make this mountain the highest mountain? On this second Sunday of Advent, I want to follow the Church as she invites us to look at another chapter of Isaiah—namely, the magnificent eleventh chapter, which describes the world that emerges at the coming of the Messiah.

We come once again to Advent, the beginning of the liturgical year and the great season of waiting. Christian life has a permanent Advent quality, for we are always expecting the coming of the Lord. Now, Jesus came, he will definitively come, and he is coming even now—for the risen Lord wants to take up residence in us today. So Advent is, perhaps most immediately, a preparation for that coming; we are getting ourselves ready to receive the Christ who wants, even now, to be born in us. Well, how do we do this? Our readings for this first Sunday of Advent give us some wonderful instruction.

It is extraordinarily significant that the liturgical year ends with the feast of Christ the King. For this great fact—that Jesus Christ is the king of the world—is indeed the culmination of the biblical revelation. It is, in a very real sense, the point of the whole story the Bible is telling.

I’m pretty sure that in thirty years of priesthood, I’ve never preached on this Sunday’s short second reading from Paul’s second letter to the Thessalonians. And what a little gem it is! Isn’t it fascinating that St. Paul, precisely in the context of a letter to his church on spiritual matters, endeavors to speak of work? When we do authentic work—of whatever kind—we participate in God’s ongoing creation and providence. Don’t follow the instinct to secularize work; rather, see your daily labor, however humble, as part of God’s plan to bring you to joy.

The story conveyed in our first reading from the second book of Maccabees is one that resonates up and down the ages, that still stirs our hearts today. It’s the story of a martyr’s death. We can talk about heaven, we can speculate about it, we can write learned treatises about it, and we can hope for it. But up and down the centuries, it is the martyrs—from the ancient Maccabees to the Christians slain by ISIS—that most vividly witness to the promise of heaven. They literally bet their lives on it.

In Luke’s Gospel we read the story of Jesus and Zacchaeus. Zacchaeus, as chief tax collector, was considered a very bad man in first-century Israel, but Christ greets him with love. It is the love of God that causes everything to be, and comes before everything we do. God does not love us because we do good; we do good because God loves us.

Our gorgeous and deeply moving second reading this week is taken from Paul’s second letter to Timothy. I wonder whether I might invite especially the elders among us to attend carefully to this letter. It is the letter of an old man at the end of his life’s work, passing advice and authority on to his younger colleague. As he often does, Paul makes a comparison to sporting events. There is something at stake in the Christian life, something worth striving for. It is like a great race, in which we strive to win. We are meant to make it to the goal line—and perhaps the last miles will be the hardest.

Explore the universal instinct to pray, especially the deep-rooted practice of petitionary prayer. Discover how even nonbelievers find themselves asking for divine assistance. Learn about the vital role of persistent prayer through biblical stories like those of Moses and the persistent widow. Understand that God responds more readily to heartfelt, continuous appeals compared to an indifferent figure. This discussion emphasizes the importance of perseverance and connection with the divine in overcoming life's challenges.

I have always loved the story of Naaman the Syrian, which is found in the second book of Kings, as part of the Elisha cycle of readings. It is, on the surface at least, a very simple narrative, but it packs a punch spiritually speaking.