Third Sunday of Advent, Cycle C. Today’s readings: Zephaniah 3:14-18a; Philippians 4:4-7; Luke 3:10-18.
The question “What must we do?” is posed three times in today’s gospel. The addressee is John the Baptist, whose reputation as a charismatic preacher drew people from all walks of life to him. John was anything but a cosy figure, and he certainly did not mince his words. In the lines directly preceding today’s gospel passage he addresses his listeners as a “brood of vipers”, and admonishes them that “even now the axe is lying at the root of the trees; every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire”. (Luke 3:9)
This approach is a million miles away from the saccharine tone of much contemporary preaching. We don’t need to look to the extremes of the so-called ‘Prosperity Gospel’ purveyors (those who promise health and wealth in return for donations and positive thoughts) to see that the pendulum has swung from one extreme to the other: the fire-and-brimstone sermons of centuries past have morphed into a sentimental morass of feel-good platitudes where repentance and conversion feature little, if at all.
In their book, sociologists Christian Smith and Melinda Lundquist Denton coined the term Moralistic Therapeutic Deism (MTD) to describe the core religious beliefs of youths in the US.In their book Soul Searching: The Religious and Spiritual Lives of American Teenagers (2005), sociologists Christian Smith and Melinda Lundquist Denton coined the term Moralistic Therapeutic Deism (MTD) to describe the core religious beliefs of youths in the US. MTD is basically a watered-down pseudo-Christianity, involving a creator God who sounds very much like a divine Santa Claus.
I don’t write this facetiously. Along with a belief that God wants us to be nice and fair to each other, and that good people will go to heaven when they die, the central tenets of MTD include the following: “The central goal of life is to be happy and to feel good about oneself. God does not need to be particularly involved in one’s life except when God is needed to resolve a problem.”
If we’re honest, we should admit that such beliefs are frequently not that dissimilar to our own. And in the interest of honesty, I should confess that I myself may have occasionally preached along such lines: a counterfeit faith that is more about how good it makes me feel, rather than about how good it helps me be in response to a loving God who is holy.
Yet for true disciples, faith and religion are not about obtaining and cultivating positive feelings (the ‘therapeutic’ part of MTD), but rather about allowing God’s irruption into our lives, to make us more like himself. John’s interlocutors in today’s gospel show remarkable courage when they ask him what they must do to please God. He was, after all, an eccentric preacher who embraced a radical lifestyle, clothing himself in camel hair and subsisting on a diet of locusts and wild honey!
And yet his advice to them is not at all outlandish or extreme; his prescription for holiness can basically be boiled down to charity and integrity in one’s daily life and duties. To the people in general he speaks about sharing one’s possessions with those who have none. The tax collectors and soldiers he enjoins to act justly and correctly, and to not abuse of their power.
John’s prescription for godliness is eminently doable and is thus also a prescription for joy. It reminds us that holiness is achievable even for us regular “people in the street”. Not by our own efforts, certainly, but through the grace of one far greater than John: Christ, who baptises with the Holy Spirit and with fire.
John the Baptist’s prescription for holiness can basically be boiled down to charity and integrity in one’s daily life and duties
We too are invited to joyfully receive Zephaniah’s words in today’s first reading, therefore: “Fear not, O Zion, be not discouraged! The Lord, your God, is in your midst, a mighty saviour; he will rejoice over you with gladness, and renew you in his love.”
bgatt@maltachurchtribunals.org