Fourth Sunday of Advent, December 20, 2020: O Key of David

On the fourth Sunday of Advent King David comes into special focus.  The first reading is just one of the prophecies where God promises David that the Messiah will be his heir, as in this excerpt,

And when your time comes and you rest with your ancestors,
I will raise up your heir after you, sprung from your loins,
and I will make his kingdom firm.
I will be a father to him,
and he shall be a son to me.
Your house and your kingdom shall endure forever before me;
your throne shall stand firm forever.'” (2Sam 7:12-14)

In the gospel, God is shown to fulfill this promise, after one thousand years, as the angel Gabriel announces God's request to Mary to be the Mother of the Messiah,

"Behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son,
and you shall name him Jesus.
He will be great and will be called Son of the Most High,
and the Lord God will give him the throne of David his father,
and he will rule over the house of Jacob forever,
and of his kingdom there will be no end.” (Lk 1:31-33)

Moreover today, December 20th, in the O Antiphons, Jesus is hailed as Key of David. What is it about David that was so important then?

We could say that of all the Jewish kings, it was David who is featured in a heart to heart relationship with God. Throughout his life, he is shown to reverence God in a personally intimate communication with God and God with him, through the prophets.  David’s reign is held up as an ideal, one of faithfulness to the Lord, protection of all the people, extending justice and mercy. Despite all his flaws and his sins, David’s immediate recognition of them and his sincere repentance from the heart, are all part of his sincere love for God.

These prophecies of a Son of David, to sit on his throne, seemed so difficult to maintain in the peoples' oppression, and poverty and yet they remained a sacred hope. Now, after a thousand years, Jesus the Messiah was to enter our world and take the throne of David his father.  The joy of Christmas is on our doorstep!

As the Key of David, Jesus opens up our full inheritance as God's children to join him in bringing about the Kingdom of God that is peace, love, care for all, forgiveness, and new life, far surpassing what could have been imagined by his devout ancestor King. Come, Lord Jesus!

-Sister Wendy Cotter, csj

Contemplative Sitting Network Reflection

I wanted to share with you this article written for the Institute of Contemplative Sitting Network from Sister Nancy Sylvester, an IHM Sister from Michigan.

-Sister Pat St. Louis, csj

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Bruno Barnhart was a Camaldolese monk who died in 2015. In his book The Future of Wisdom, he states, “The Christian history of the past two thousand years has been characterized by a continual tendency to reverse the event of the incarnation and separate once again the divine and the human, Trinity and humanity, God and Creation.” 

David Bohm was a physicist, in fact, one of the most significant in the 20th century, who died in 1992.  He said, “What is preventing mankind from working together….is a kind of thought that treats things as inherently divided…Each part is considered to be essentially independent …It’s similar to a virus…a disease of thought.”

In this time of COVID19, we do well to remember every time we sit in contemplative silence, alone or with others, we are generating antibodies to the above “thought disease” of both church and society.  Intentionally dwelling in oneness with ourselves, others, Earth, and the Divine, however much we are assaulted by thoughts or other distractions, we are in fact about immersing our consciousness in the source of ultimate unity.  We imbibe the correcting antidote.   We experience the unification of ourselves and our fractured Universe.  The Christ is once again being reborn in both ourselves and our world.

-Margaret Galiardi, OP and Nancy Sylvester, IHM

Reprinted with kind permission from Nancy Sylvester, IHM Detroit, MI.    

The Institute for Communal Contemplation and Dialogue is offering 3 programs via Zoom in January, February, and March 2021. To learn more about the newest program, click here: Enter the Chaos: Engage the Differences to Make a Difference.

We Write for Rights - #Write4Rights #W4R20

Sister Olga, faithfully writing at 97 years of age

The Sisters of St. Joseph have been friends of Amnesty International for decades.  We’ve delighted in the annual visit of its well-known former Secretary General for Canada, Alex Neve, and his workers throughout the last fifteen years. Besides contributing monetary donations, Amnesty’s yearly Write for Rights initiative is an advocacy opportunity we’ve embraced since 2012.  This year was no different.

On the appointed December 10th, a group of our senior Sisters armed with pen and paper wrote 140 letters to various leaders throughout the world, pleading for amnesty and justice for their people who have been illegally incarcerated for standing up for human rights and justice in their countries.

140letters~ in the mail!

We read the cases of six specific men and women whose lives have been disrupted due to their support of others whose water, lands, and forests have been devastated and razed by companies seeking to advance their own financial largesse. The fact that our letters matter is evidenced by the success that has resulted for victims through the pressures our writing has exerted on various countries’ leaders.

I sensed a blessing descend upon our home as Sisters wrote impassioned pleas to repressive governments to right the wrongs of advocates unjustly treated for working on behalf of humanity.  There is no better way to live these Advent weeks than to raise our voices against injustices.  It is a powerful practice in preparing the way of the Lord.

-Sister Jean Moylan

National Day of Prayer in Solidarity with Indigenous Peoples

Our Lady of Guadalupe, Patroness of the Americas is celebrated on the National Day of Prayer in Solidarity with Indigenous Peoples, December 12th. A feast commemorating a religious event in the 16th century is now intertwined with our growing awareness of Indigenous peoples throughout the world – their strength, resilience, and rightful place in society. In the film The Condor and the Eagle we see such strength and resilience as four Indigenous leaders make a trans-continental journey from the Canadian plains to the heart of the Amazonian jungle. Their purpose - to unite the peoples of North and South America and deepen the meaning of "Climate Justice."  

At the heart of the journey is the indigenous prophecy “When the eagle of the North and the condor of the South fly together, Indigenous peoples will unite the human family.”  This underlies the amazing story, as we watch a shift of identity. Once forgotten voices rise to become strong communities with power to bring change to their world.

The experience of Juan Diego filled him with hope and belief in the spiritual protection offered through his extraordinary experience.

With the struggle and dialogue of Indigenous people in Canada, new hope is rising. This month the Liberal government of Canada introduced legislation to begin the process of bringing Canadian law into alignment with the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People (UNDRIP). Lots of hard work and dialogue lie ahead, but the shift has begun.

www.cbc.ca/news/politics/liberals-introduce-undrip-legislation-1.5826523

As we remember the Indigenous saint of the South, we celebrate yet one more step in the North to live into reconciliation.

-Sister Loretta Manzara, csj