Must I be joyful?

Homily

3rd Sunday of Advent C2

Gaudete Sunday

15 December 2024

St. Ann Catholic Church - Prairie Village, KS

AMDG

Must I be joyful?

The Church on Gaudete Sunday, Pink Sunday, Rejoice Sunday, forces the issue more than a little.  Everywhere we turn in this liturgy, there is a command.  Rejoice! Did you hear me?  Rejoice or else!  Rejoice no matter what!  Hey I'm talking to you, and I'll say it again, rejoice!

What gives?  Can the Church demand that I be joyful? Is that how this works?  What if I don't feel joyful this Christmas?  What good does it do to shout at me and demand that I rejoice?

Trust me, I wish it was this easy.  Sometimes when I come to Mass, I don't feel joyful.  I can be tired, skeptical, anxious.  Sometimes I wish I didn't have to bring the faith and energy every time.

Yet in commanding joy, the Church is simply asking me to live in reality.  I am here to recognize the truth that my Savior is near.  The command to rejoice is never asking you to feel differently than you do. Feelings can't be commanded.  It's not wishing upon a star, for joy is not a shifting emotion nor a naive optimism.  Joy must be something else.  It's an objective reality.  It is a truth.  It's a fruit of the Holy Spirit, a love that endures and conquers all things, that is dwelling near me and indeed in me.

Must I be joyful?  Only if I want to live in reality, the reality that I am wheat, not chaff.   Must I be joyful?  If I embrace the truth of who God is, joy will certainly result.  For if God was not closer to me than I am to myself, I could not exist.  Still more, if there is not a mercy greater than sin, evil and death, that is coming to visit me, then I am doomed.  My days are numbered.

John the Baptist is the greatest true prophet, announcing the good news of reality!  Jesus wants to be born for you and in you, precisely as you are on Christmas, 2024.  The shifting circumstances and cocktail of emotions you are experiencing are as nothing compared to this truth.  If Jesus is asking you intimately and personally to hold Him in your heart this Christmas, you have nothing to fear.  Living in this reality, has only one response, which the Church command on Gaudete Sunday.

Yes I command you, because I have to tell you the truth, and I say it again, rejoice!

+mj