Dear friends in Christ
I would like to begin Advent by sharing with you some helpful lines from a sermon on Advent by Monsignor Ronald Knox, preached in 1947:
Everybody knows, even those of us who have lived most unadventurously, what it is to plod on for miles, it seems, eagerly straining your eyes towards the lights that, somehow, mean home. How difficult it is, when you are doing that to judge distances! In pitch darkness, it might be a couple of miles to your destination, it might be a few hundred yards. So it was, I think, with the Hebrew prophets, as they looked forward to the redemption of their people. They could not have told you, within a hundred years, within five hundred years, when it was the deliverance would come. They only knew that, some time, the stock of David would burgeon anew; some time, a key would be found to fit the door of their prison house; some time, the light that only showed, now, like a will-o'-the-wisp on the horizon would broaden out, at last, into the perfect day.
This attitude of expectation is one which the Church wants to encourage in us, her children, permanently. She sees it as an essential part of our Christian drill that we should still be looking forward; getting on for two thousand years, now, since the first Christmas Day came and went, and we must still be looking forward. So she encourages us, during Advent, to take the shepherd-folk for our guides, and imagine ourselves travelling with them, at dead of night, straining our eyes towards that chink of light which streams out, we know, from the cave at Bethlehem.
In order to live in this manner, we need to keep our eyes fixed less on earthly things at this time, and more on the things of God, the reality of Heaven. We will remain ready and attentive to God if we concentrate on our personal prayer, and avoid becoming slipshod in the ways of our Faith. The two great figures of Advent are Our Blessed Lady and Saint John the Baptist; together they will help us contemplate the things that are above. The Old Testament Prophets too, in spite of their sometimes hard rhetoric, will keep us focused and on course as we move through these twenty-four days that will lead by thoughts of the Second Coming of Jesus, to His first coming in time.
Friday was a sad day for our nation and a tragedy for what has been called the ‘Mother of Parliaments’. Our MP has written to me, and I am sure to many of you too, setting-out his position on Assisted Dying: As you may now be aware, I voted for this Bill at Second Reading to allow the debate to move forward and further scrutiny to happen. I must be clear that this doesn’t mean I will be supporting the Bill at further stages if my concerns are not satisfied. My starting point in this debate are my own personal views. I am personally against assisted dying. My faith as a Christian is part of my rationale. But there are also my own selfish reasons in that I could not bear to be present whilst someone I love knowingly took their own life. This is more down to my own personal fear of loss. Thank you for engaging with me on this hugely important issue, and I would encourage you to continue to do so as this process continues and we assess the next steps at Third Reading.
Thanks to all of you who helped with the Bazaar last weekend—the amount raised was £2276.05—those who contributed gifts, those who helped with the organisation and all of you who came and supported the event. As in previous years, we will donate the monies raised to support two important Charities: Aid to the Church in Need in their work to provide relief to families in Lebanon and our local St Vincent de Paul Centre in Southend who work with the homeless. God bless you all for your generosity.
May God bless us as we enter this time of Advent together!
Msgr Kevin Hale