13 December 2025 - Saturday of the 2nd week of Advent
Homily
Since the beginning of Advent, the first reading at Mass has been taken from the Book of Isaiah. We have thus quickly gone through this beautiful book, through well-chosen texts with a messianic flavor, and especially, during the last week, the second part of the Book of Isaiah, called ‘The Book of the Consolation of Israel’.
Starting today, the first reading will bring us, one after another, various other prophets or sages of Israel. Today it will be Ben Sira the Wise, in a text that speaks of the prophet Elijah and which, as the prophet Malachi had also done, announces the return of Elijah at the end of time. We know that Jesus, in his testimony about John the Baptist, said that ‘the prophet who is to come is he.’
We find this statement by Jesus twice in the Gospel of Matthew, and we have the second one in today's Gospel. Jesus' first statement was made to John's disciples who had come to ask him, ‘Are you the one who is to come?’ Today, Jesus responds to an explicit question from his own disciples who ask him why the scribes say that Elijah must come first before the Messiah appears. The scribes were obviously relying on Malachi's prophecy. Jesus then replied that Elijah had indeed returned, but in the person of John.
The importance that the liturgy gives to the figure of John the Baptist, whom we heard about in last Sunday's Gospel and whom we will hear about again tomorrow, is based on the fact that his mission was ultimately to prepare the people to receive the Messiah. His message was one of conversion.
This message is also addressed to us. As we prepare to celebrate the Incarnation of the Son of God, we must prepare our hearts for this celebration. What we celebrate at Christmas is not simply the fact that God came once, two thousand years ago, but also the fact that he comes continually into our lives. And that is why the monastic vow of ‘conversion’ is a commitment to convert ourselves continually in order to prepare ourselves continually for God's coming into our lives.
Jesus is not the one who came, or who will come. He is the one who is coming.
Armand Veilleux