November 29: Preparing to Celebrate Sunday’s Mass / Preparándonos para Celebrar la Misa Dominical

As we celebrate the First Sunday of Advent this weekend, do not miss the first line in Matthew 24, 37-44: “As it was in the days of Noah.” Jesus speaks these words and He presumes that everyone knows how it was in the days of Noah. Knowing that, in fact, is essential to knowing what Jesus is talking about. 

“The days of Noah” were marked by people eating and drinking, marrying and being given in marriage. That seems like normal behavior, doesn’t it? Yet those days were also marked by corruption and lawlessness. In a sense, nothing much has changed.

What Jesus draws our attention to is this: what was most absent in the days of Noah was any obvious attention to God. What was missing was a relationship with God, which would make a difference in the way things were. 

Noah, however, found favor with God. Noah did what no one else would do: listen to God. And he did what God asked. He did what made no sense to anyone else. He built a big boat. He risked the ridicule of everyone –  in order to do what God asked of him. 

So, that’s the way it was in the days of Noah, people just going about their lives with no thought of (nor any attention to) God. But there was one person who was listening and obedient, and because of that obedience and a willingness to take a risk, there was salvation. Be sure to come to Mass this weekend ready to look for the connection between Noah and Jesus. Hint: attentive to God, listening, obedient, taking a risk – bringing salvation to the whole human family.

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Las primeras comunidades cristianas vivieron años muy difíciles. Perdidos en el vasto Imperio de Roma, en medio de conflictos y persecuciones, aquellos discípulos buscaban fuerza y aliento esperando la pronta venida de Jesús y recordando sus palabras: “Velen. Estén preparados. Vigilan. Tengan los ojos abiertos. Estén alertas.”
 ¿Significan todavía algo para nosotros las llamadas de Jesús a vivir despiertos? ¿Qué es hoy para nosotros poner nuestra esperanza en Dios viviendo con los ojos abiertos? ¿Dejaremos que se agote definitivamente en nuestro mundo secular la esperanza en una última justicia de Dios para esa inmensa mayoría de víctimas inocentes que sufren sin culpa alguna?

Vigilar es vivir atentos a la realidad. Escuchar los gemidos de los que sufren. Sentir el amor de Dios a la vida. Vivir más atentos a su presencia misteriosa entre nosotros. Sin esta sensibilidad, no es posible caminar tras los pasos de Jesús. De hecho, si no despertamos, a todos nos puede ocurrir lo de aquellos de la parábola que todavía, al final de los tiempos, preguntaban: “Señor, ¿cuándo te vimos hambriento, o sediento, o extranjero, o desnudo, o enfermo, o en la cárcel, y no te asistimos?” (Mateo 25)