First Sunday of Advent (Year A): Keep Watch

What is Advent?
We are now in the holy season of Advent, where we prepare for Christ's coming at Christmas and the second coming at the end of time.  It is a spiritual period to meditate on these two mysteries and prepare for them.  We use the wreath and 4 candles to mark the 4 weeks before Christmas.  

Three of the candles are purple and one is rose or pink.  The purple symbolizes preparation through penance and prayer.  Purple is also used during Lent.  Another way to see it is purple is a physical sign of healing. When we get hurt, the injury becomes purple.  During the time of healing, it remains purple until it clears up.  Sin hurts us and we need time to heal from it by using the Sacraments of Penance and Eucharist, Prayer, Fasting, Indulgences, and genuine Spiritual life.  

The rose/pink is for the third Sunday or Gaudete Sunday which means "Sunday of Joy."   We are joyous because we are getting closer to Christ's birth.  As each week goes on, we light the candle that corresponds to that week. We at Sacerdotus now offer masks and shirts with the Advent wreath.  Visit, www.sacerdotusstore.com.    

Reflection on the Readings for November 30, 2025: First Sunday of Advent (Year A)

We are now at Year A in the Liturgical Reading cycle.  As we kindle the first violet candle on our Advent wreaths today, the Church invites us into a season of holy anticipation—not mere waiting, but an active, vigilant preparation for the Lord's coming. The readings for this First Sunday of Advent in Year A paint a vivid tapestry of hope, urgency, and transformation, drawing us from prophetic visions of peace to the stark call of Christian readiness. In a world often marked by division and distraction, these Scriptures challenge us to reorient our lives toward the "mountain of the Lord," where swords become plowshares and justice flows like water.

The prophet Isaiah's oracle in the first reading (Isaiah 2:1-5) opens with a breathtaking vision of universal pilgrimage: "In days to come, the mountain of the Lord's house shall be established as the highest mountain and raised above the hills." This is no distant dream but a divine promise of reconciliation, where all nations stream toward Zion, drawn by the light of God's instruction. Isaiah, speaking to a Judah teetering on the edge of exile, envisions a radical reversal—war's instruments reforged into tools of cultivation, and enemies walking side by side in peace. "They shall beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks," he declares, echoing God's longing for shalom, wholeness that heals every fracture. Yet this hope is not passive; it demands response: "Come, let us walk in the light of the Lord." In our reflection, Isaiah beckons us to examine our own "swords"—the grudges we sharpen, the conflicts we perpetuate—and to surrender them at the foot of Christ's cross, the true mountain of salvation.

This prophetic hope finds its echo and fulfillment in the responsorial psalm (Psalm 122:1-2, 3-4, 4-5, 6-7, 8-9), a song of ascent that captures the joy of journeying to God's house. "I rejoiced when I heard them say: 'Let us go to the house of the Lord!'" The psalmist describes Jerusalem as a city "compact and firm," its gates thronged with pilgrims bearing offerings, its walls a bulwark for peace. Praying for the prosperity of this holy city, the poet intercedes not just for its inhabitants but for all who seek justice: "For the peace of Jerusalem: 'May those who love you prosper; may peace be within your walls.'" As we enter Advent, this psalm stirs a communal longing in our hearts. In an era of polarized discourse and fractured communities, do we yearn for the "gates of Jerusalem" as fervently? The psalm reminds us that true peace begins in prayer and pilgrimage, in gathering as the Body of Christ to celebrate the Eucharist, where we taste the unity Isaiah foretold.

Saint Paul's exhortation in the second reading (Romans 13:11-14) injects a note of eschatological urgency, transforming Advent's hope into a call to moral awakening. "You know the time; it is the hour now for you to awake from sleep," he writes to the Roman Christians, amid whispers of persecution and the shadow of empire. Paul likens our salvation to the breaking dawn, urging us to "lay aside the works of darkness and put on the armor of light." This is no vague spirituality but concrete action: "Make no provision for the desires of the flesh," he insists, clothing ourselves instead in the Lord Jesus Christ. Drawing from the imagery of night yielding to day, Paul evokes the Advent theme of vigilance—Christ's coming disrupts complacency, demanding we discard the "carousing and drunkenness" that numb us to God's voice. In my own life, this passage convicts me of the subtle "sleeps" I indulge: the endless scroll of social media that dulls my prayer, the grudges I nurse under the guise of self-protection. Paul's words are a trumpet blast, calling us to live as children of the light, armored not for battle but for the vulnerable work of love.

The Gospel from Matthew (24:37-44) sharpens this vigilance into a parable of sudden reckoning, as Jesus warns of the Son of Man's unexpected return. Recalling the days of Noah—when people ate, drank, and married until the flood swept them away—Jesus paints a picture of normalcy shattered by divine interruption. "Stay awake, therefore, for you do not know on which day your Lord will come," he cautions, likening the hour to a thief in the night. Two men in the field, two women at the mill: one taken, one left. This is not a blueprint for apocalyptic frenzy but a summons to faithful stewardship. The wise servant, trusted with the household, is found vigilant upon the master's return. In Advent's lengthening shadows, Matthew's Jesus confronts our illusions of control. We, too, build our arks in the ordinary—family dinners, work commutes, quiet moments of doubt—never knowing when grace will flood in. This reading haunts and humbles me, for it reveals how easily I prioritize the urgent over the eternal. Yet it also liberates: readiness is not perfection but presence, a heart attuned to the Master's knock.

These readings converge on Advent's core paradox: the already and the not-yet. Isaiah's mountain looms as the destiny of creation, the psalm pulses with the rhythm of worship, Paul arms us for the dawn, and Jesus keeps us watchfully awake. Together, they form a liturgy of longing, preparing us not just for Christmas cribs but for the fullness of the Kingdom. As we light this first candle, may we heed the prophet's invitation, the psalmist's prayer, the apostle's wake-up call, and the Lord's urgent whisper. In doing so, we become pilgrims of peace, armored in light, ever ready for the One who comes to make all things new. Come, Lord Jesus—may your Advent transform us.