November 28th

Monday, 28 November 2022: 1st Week of Advent
Mr. Ohizu: Campus Minister
Isaiah 4:2-6; PS 122:1-2, 3-4b, 4cd-5, 6-7, 8-9; Matthew 8:5-11
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, the advent season is upon us once again. As we enter
this year’s season of Advent, the time of preparation for Christmas, through the words of Sacred
Scriptures in today’s readings, all of us are being reminded that there will be a time when the
Lord will come again in His glory, to gather us all, His beloved people and all His faithful ones
into his Kingdom. My prayer is that on that day, all of us may find rest and true happiness in
Him.
Especially during this Advent season, we are all called to rediscover our connection and
strengthen our relationship with God, whose coming we celebrate this Christmas. We are once
more, reminded too that we should have faith in God and in His providence, and that in Him we
shall have sure hope of eternal life and salvation, and we should believe in Him wholeheartedly
and sincerely, devoting ourselves, our time, effort, and attention to serve Him in every moment
of our lives.
In today’s Gospel, we hear the story of Jesus healing the centurion’s servant. The
centurion had faith enough to believe that Jesus would cure his servant in the proper time, by just
saying a word of healing. I wonder if the centurion realized that in trying to broker a cure for his
servant, he is brokering a cure, a conversion of heart for himself and for us as well. Over two
thousand years ago this servant was paralyzed, he was in pain and unable to move. Isn’t that all
of us at one time or the other these days?
This is the perfect Gospel for the beginning of Advent. If we look close enough, we will
see that we are both the centurion and his unseen and ill servant in a time of waiting, an Advent
of their own, if you will. Like the centurion, we want healing for the ones we care about, perhaps
including ourselves, all done out of love. We do not feel worthy to have the Divine Physician
Jesus make a house call or even cross the threshold of our innermost self. Our inner room is not
tidied up enough to receive divine callers, we think. Yet, we do recognize the authority and skill
of the Physician, Jesus Christ. We trust that there will be a cure when he arrives.
In one way or the other, we are also the servant, paralyzed and stuck in place, unable to
move from our current condition without the curing Word. With a word, Jesus who is the Divine
Word can make our hurt disappear, get us on our feet and back on the path to do the work we are
called to do. To care for the unloved, the poor and vulnerable, to nurture children yet to be born
and the conditions their expectant mothers live in, to carter for people who are underpaid and
underemployed, people brought low by racism, discrimination and marginalization, people
sitting on death row, people facing the cross hairs of war and hate, just like the people of
Ukraine.
Hence, today as we continue our journey through this blessed season of Advent, let us all
reflect on our attitudes in life, in our way of life and in how each one of us have responded to
God’s call for healing in our lives. In our preparation for Christmas in particular, have we
realized and understood the true meaning and importance of Christmas to us? Or have we
allowed the extreme commercialization and secularization of Christmas to affect and influence
us? It is not wrong for us to celebrate Christmas the way that we are familiar with, but we
Christians must not allow that to distract us from appreciating and celebrating the true meaning
and importance of Christmas. Jesus came to reconcile the world to the Father. We should do our
best to observe Christmas with the true spirit and understanding of what we are celebrating, and

we should maintain our focus on the light of truth, healing, reconciliation, and salvation that
Christ has brought into our midst.
For us believers, the season of Advent is really about anticipation and incarnation, light
illuminating darkness, and God coming near. We know what time it is. Make this Advent a
genuine celebration of hope.