Alter Christus - Advent: The Coming of Christ

With the first days of December begins Advent. Forcibly then our thoughts are turned at once to the main purpose of this holy season. If from the very outset we keep that purpose before us, we shall secure four weeks of real fervor and come to Christmas with hearts fully prepared for the "coming of Christ". For this is what Christmas, primarily and above all, means to us. Of the other associations of Christmas much may be taken away this year owing to the gloomy situation of the world. What of it? Indeed it may be a gain if it makes us prepare the more eagerly, throughout Advent, for the spiritual realization of Christmas: "ut Christum lucrifaciam."

AN ARDENT LONGING

The first disposition we should have is an ardent desire for this new coming of Christ to our soul: the earnestness of our desires is a determining factor of the abundance of His grace. True, Christ always lives in a soul adorned with sanctifying grace, and He is ever trying to grow in that soul by new communications of His life. But, if entering into the spirit of the liturgy, we prepare ourselves with fervor to commemorate the great Mystery of Christ's Nativity, and spend four weeks in earnest longing for the spiritual rebirth of Christ in our soul, surely the Divine Child will give us a most abundant communication of His spirit and His virtues. It is the aim of His coming: "ut vitam abun­dantius habeant".

Let us live in that longing day by day, throughout Advent: Christ is our most precious treasure; we can have no more profitable desire than to seek for a growth of His life in us. Nor can we seek for anything better for our flock: "Filioli mei, quos iterum parturio donec formetur Christus in vobis."

* Let us resolve, then, to make our Advent a time of uninterrupted desire to bring Christ deeper and deeper into our life. - Instill that desire in the souls entrusted to us. ­

Spare no pains that the designs of the Sacred Heart's mercy be realized in them, with a special intention perhaps for some souls whose conversion hangs in the balance, or who feel a special urge towards a more intense Christian life.

READINESS TO SURRENDER

To be productive of solid results our desire for Christ must be accompanied by a great readiness to welcome Him with all His claims upon our soul. All good Christians profess the desire to have Christ enter more and more into their lives. But when it comes to the test of letting Christ have His way with them, how few prove sincere in their desires. Those who truly long for Christ's coming must be ready to sacrifice whatever is opposed to the spirit of Christ and to the new life He wishes to impart to them. That implies a generous disposition, for as often as not those mysterious" advents" of Christ spell sacrifices; and at times it may require great courage to let God play havoc, so to say, with our little plans of life, our cherished dreams, our manifold attachments. Yet, if we are not ready thus to surrender to Christ, we frustrate His designs for our sanctifica­tion, we let Him knock in vain at the door of our heart.

How many a Christmas perhaps has passed without any marked transformation in our spiritual life, because we preferred to remain as we were rather than to "put on Christ" and share something of the poverty and the humility and the mortification He teaches us from the Crib?

* Examine the sincerity of our dispositions and deter­mine to "prepare the way of the Lord" in our soul, during this Advent. .. Let us see if there is anything in our heart, about our person, in our presbytery, that should be put in order if the Babe of Bethlehem is to come there as unto His own... Promise Our Lord to refuse no sacrifice He will ask of us, cost what it may.

RECOLLECTED PRAYER

Among all the means we can use to make this season of Advent a fruitful preparation for the graces of Christmas in ourselves and in our flock, the most obvious one is prayer.

Indeed the sacred liturgy forces upon us, day by day, both in the breviary and in the Mass, appropriate prayers of humble and urgent supplication. If we say them "attente et devote" they cannot fail to increase in us a sincere longing for Christ, and they will make us very earnest in our spiritual preparation and in our zeal to prepare our flock.

Besides, we have in our daily Mass a sublime reminder of the mystery of Bethlehem. In the words of Tertullian, the priest gives to the world the same God who was born of the Virgin: "Your lips bring Him forth, your hands and your heart are the manger, and the sacramental species the swad­dling clothes." If the priest were animated with such living faith at every Consecration, and devoutly observed the rubrics of the Missal "genuflexus adorat", how much closer to the Sacred Heart would not each Mass bring him and thus prepare him for that singular growth in the life of Christ towards which Advent leads him.

* Let us determine to live in a greater spirit of prayer and recollection during this holy season, . . . to avoid mechanical routine and mere formalism in our Advent prayers, . . . and, by renewed fervor at the Consecration of our daily Mass, to keep our heart nearer to the Sacred Heart and ready for the fulness of His coming at Christmas.

"Excita, quaesumus, Domine, potentiam et veni . . . Excita, Domine, corda nostra ad praeparandas Unigeniti vias: ut per ejus adventum purificatis tibi mentibus servire mereamur . . . Concede ut, qui sub peccati iugo ex vetusta servitute deprimimur, exspectata unigeniti Filii tui nova nativitate liberemur . . ." (Orations of Advent ).

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Adapted from Alter Christus, Meditations for Priests by F.X. L'Hoir, S.J. (1958)
Meditation 12.
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Please pray for our priests and pray for vocations to the priesthood.