There are many great things that make me excited for Advent every year. The extra candles, the somewhat more somber, stripped down liturgy, and perhaps my personal      favorite: the awesome purple chasuble that I don’t get to wear near often enough. But there’s another shift that happens every year in Advent, and that is the transition Gospels we hear from week to week.
We have completed our trek through the Gospel of Mark, and we now begin a year with St. Luke.
 
St. Luke, to a greater degree than the other evangelists, places a great emphasis on stories  and narratives. The Good Samaritan, Lazarus’   Resurrection, the Prodigal Son, Jesus and the Good Thief; these are all found exclusively in the Gospel of Luke. As an individual with a flair for story    telling and a man of Irish descent, I can  unequivocally say that St. Luke’s Gospel is my favorite synoptic.
 
One of the most notable differences in the Gospel of Luke is how much more information we get about the genealogy and birth of Jesus. We know more about the Holy Family’s travels and the personal history of Our Lord from
St. Luke than we do from anyone else. But if we pay close attention to the Gospels chosen for Advent,we can see the Church drawing our attention to something else before we get to those beautiful Christmas stories.

In the first few weeks of Advent we don’t hear about the manger or the visitation, but instead we hear about the end of the world and John the   Baptist’s preaching in the wilderness. Before we can receive the Joy of the Nativity, we must  recognize our limited time on this earth, clear space in our hearts, and remove all the obstacles that stand in the way of Jesus reigning in  our hearts.

Christmas is quickly approaching, and if you’re anything like me, you still have a thousand things to do to get ready to celebrate with family and friends. (Full disclosure, I haven’t even thought about gifts yet.) But if we truly want to experience the joy of the birth of Our Lord in a few weeks, we have to plant the seeds now and decide what we will do to “make straight the path of the Lord.” Go to Deacon Walt’s Gospel reflections. Read the Gospel of the day before the busyness of work and kids sets in. Above all, go to confession and check your sins at the door. Anything, even something small, is better than nothing. In the coming week, pray and ask for God’s guidance as to how you can get ready to have a spiritually fruitful Christmas. God will open our hearts and change our lives, but only if we first invite Him in.
 
Prayers always,
Fr. McCullough